There is a question that I would like to be asked. It's probably not a unique question. Some people may believe it to be inappropriate or insensitive or somehow oppressive. To those people I saw, this is my existence; you are not invited into it so feel free to take your thoughts and voices away. To those who care to listen, here it is:
"What is it like being me?"
Tonight, I think about this. What is it like being a man? Specifically, what is it like being a nearly 31-year-old man, from India, struggling to get a career, living at home, and hiding some non-traditional personality traits from family? What is it like living /dealing with mental illness? What is it like being praised as a genius but feeling like a failure? What is it like being unable to cry? What is it like being unable to really rely on friends and family? To that extent, what is it like feeling alien to both halves of one's family?
All I can say is that it feels tremendously isolating. I want to kick and scream and yell. I want to be engaged with. I want to be treated with sympathy. I want someone to consciously make time in their day for me. I want to feel like a priority. I want to feel like I make a positive difference in their life. I want to be flirted with and romanced and loved. I want to be cherished.
I'm also unbelievably exhausted. Tired of taking on everyone's issues. Tired of being everyone's shoulder to rely on for emotional well-being. Tired of being taken for granted.
In a more general sense, I don't enjoy being so cynical about people or the world. I want to find my place, even if it's just within 4 walls and a handful of spaces. Of late, I've felt that things have taken a bit of a sour turn in my relationships, within me. I find that I just want to spend more and more time alone instead of trying to engage with the people that I claim that I like. That isn't to say that I don't like them or even love them, but just that I want to just be by myself yet be important, and contradictingly, ethereal in their lives.
What I fear today is that I might be losing my humanity, my kindness. Since I no longer claim the title of "smartest in the room", I had tried to be the kindest...but it appears that I might lost that. A strange sense of apathy seems to blanket my current existence. I want to believe that isn't the case. I worry that it might be.
Am I consigned to an existence on singledom, or perhaps pseudo-singledom? My dreams of a legacy and heirs seem to have dried up. I have mourned them multiple times, and probably will in the future too. I cannot decide if it's a wise decision. To choose to be a parent...seems like I have probably missed my mark (yet another probably senseless thing said by someone in their early 30s).
I feel the weight of unfulfilled expectations: I should have had a job by now; I should have been married by now; I should have had a kid by now; I should have a home by now. I want to believe that at the core of it all, I am still a scared child who is struggling, but if I may be honest with myself, I am not scared, I am overwhelmed. I fear failure. I fear making mistakes. I fear not being "good enough" to face all that life is throwing at me. It never occurs to me naturally that I should ask for help.
I cannot trust freely. I cannot believe that I can rely on someone in troubled times. I have been abandoned at times when I thought that it would be obvious not to. Even then, I've had to step up and support those around me.
I've had immense trouble setting boundaries, advocating for my needs, and just generally being honest with others and myself. Anger seems to be my default, and I've had a terrible role model in handling that. It has chased away people. The problem has seemed to get worse in the last year. Is it because I'm trying to be more conscious of it? Am I just mentally tired all the time? I don't want to be consumed by it.
