Lasting a day can be an achievement

I am ridiculously enthusiastic, energetic and optimistic today. I say 'ridiculously' not to make you think this is a disappointing state to be in, but to highlight how unusual it is for me to feel this way in recent times. Or for most of my adult life, to be honest!

I am realising more and more, as my time on this planet races onward and my age starts to resemble a speed limit rather than a radiator setting, that I am quite an unusual chap and that I think very differently to most people. I think, dare I say it, that I probably find day-to-day life more difficult than a lot of you lovely folk out there. That may be down to my upbringing, or it may be some kind of neurodiversity, or it may just be that I lack the necessary skills to find this stuff easy, and I lack the ability to learn those skills as I go. I really don't know, and I'm not sure my life would be improved by knowing why this is; but I think it's important to acknowledge that it is true, and to be kind to myself about that reality and to not make myself feel shitty just because I think I 'should' be able to cope with life. There are so many hard circumstances and tricky situations that we all have to get through in our everyday existence, and I have no doubt that overwhelm and fear get their claws into everyone at some time or other, but I also have no doubt that there are those of us that struggle with those things a bit more, and more often, than others. What may be a mere inconvenience for you might be a major mishap for me. What I can breeze through with barely a thought might trouble you for more than a fortnight. We all have our ways, and our ways of coping, and life is a different dilemma for us all.

I guess what I'm saying is - every single one of us is simultaneously able and unable; confident and terrified; experienced and naive; hopeful and desperate. We all suffer the downs as much as we enjoy the ups, we all get confused as much as we feel sure, and we all want to hide undercover as much as we want to face the world head on. And that's ok. That's human.

RC 22-11-24