Alora Fane

Some venting in response to previous posts. Much of how I react internally to things these days comes from traumatic past experiences, and it's difficult to connect with people who are all like one another but different to you.

I was planning to write a post about the current state of Dreamons today, though my recent mental health posts got more attention than recent posts usually do, and I wasn't able to get through replying to all the comments, so I wanted to write a bit about that again.

I got derailed a bit though - and spent the morning feeling frustrated, so sorry if that spills over into this post - as I woke up to see some notifications from my Discord server. I rarely go in there, and only seem to occasionally get notifications for some of the things people say (and it's rare in general that anyone posts there), but when I do I at least try to glance at them to see if there's anything that needs my urgent attention.

This time, I noticed what seemed like people grouping together to talk negatively about Jordan Peterson, after I mentioned him in the recent post.

Ugh. I almost used a vague term like "an author" instead of a specific name while writing that post, and now wish that I had.

I don't even know if that's what people were actually talking about, though; it might have been one comment that others disagreed with for all I know. I didn't want to read the whole discussion in case I got more annoyed, though, and instead my demons just assembled an imaginary argument out of memories of how such times went in the past.

I won't go on about that at length - I've already spent all morning basically mentally arguing with ghosts about it - but I wonder what the discerning saints who dislike that particular person would have said in my position the other day, when I was talking to the receptionist and she brought him up. Would they have launched into some tirade about what a bigot he is, and what a fool she was for giving him any attention? That would have been the socially adept thing to do, right? Totally conducive to connection. Grumble grumble.

It bothers me mostly due to painful memories of being dogpiled by an audience that were in agreement with one another in disagreeing with me. An awful experience, that. Would not recommend.

Our minds use our past experiences to form models of the world and expectations for how the future will go, and it's such a shame that I've had far more negative experiences than positive ones, so that's all I've come to expect.

Speaking of painful memories, I used to vent in my blog a lot during the Fig Hunter days, and got increasingly frustrated by how many of the responses were advice that I hadn't asked for. In small doses I imagine that can be accepted with gratitude even if it's not exactly wanted, but it was the sheer volume back then that just made me sick of it.

Interestingly, one of the topics covered in the last counselling class I went to was how a counsellor's role is not to ever give advice. You're meant to give your client a chance to speak without judgement, which for many people is all they really need to heal. There's a reason why this is a skill people have to go and train, though. Wanting to say something to improve the situation is only natural, and men in particular - which most of the people who've ever commented on my stuff have been - are well-known to be more inclined towards fixing rather than just listening reassuringly.

I'm fascinated by Psychology and definitely see the value in discerning which conditions a person might have, but something I've been dwelling on lately is how people seem so inclined to pathologise circumstance.

I'll try to explain what I mean through an analogy (which I also did in another recent post, though it seems worth trying again):

Imagine you've gone by yourself to study in a very foreign country for a year. China, let's say, assuming none of you are from there. Your classmates are all Chinese. On the first day, they speak to one another in Chinese, which - for the sake of this analogy - you don't speak. You try and engage them in English, to which they respond amicably in broken English, but there's clearly a communication barrier and the conversation quickly fizzles out. They turn to a Chinese person beside them and continue talking far more fluently in Chinese.

You call a friend back home and say you felt like the odd one out. "Do you think maybe you have autism?", they say. "Or how about ADHD?"

This post was originally going to be a list of all my mental health issues, why I believe I have them, why I don't think I have others (eg autism), etc, so then I could pin it and link to it in future... but it all feels largely irrelevant for my current situation.

Or rather, I'd say that mental illness was the main reason I fell into the pit I've been in for a long time, but mental illness isn't exactly the main reason my recent attempt to climb out has so far been so painful. It's the fact that I've been in the pit for so long that I'm an alien - in terms of life position - compared to people who've only lived on the surface.

I've been able to quickly and easily form bonds in the past with people who were on similar wavelengths and receptive to connection. I don't struggle with that. It's just difficult to find those people, increasingly so as I get older.

I'm not interested in acquaintance-level connections with people on completely different wavelengths to me. I get the impression that other people do find value in those, but I'd find them more of a burden than a boon.

Maybe I'll change my tune as the course goes on. We'll see.

Also, I don't want to sound ungrateful about people providing support in their own ways in comments on this blog. I do appreciate it. I suppose I'm just sore still from the frustrations of many years ago, and about the frustrations of my current situation that aren't exactly within my control.

I just wish there was somewhere obvious where I could go to find 'my people'. Online is probably my best bet, but maybe I've just got too old now so younger people would see me as an old creep for trying to interact with them - and we'd have too little in common due to generational differences anyway - and any around my age would have partners and jobs and everything.

Spending your twenties and thirties isolating from the real world is hardly a well-worn path.

I'm still working on games and stuff most days, so I really should post about at least Dreamons soon. And I'm intending to go to the class again on Wednesday, probably with different expectations this time.

7 COMMENTS

astralwolf92~8M

About pathologies, have you received a formal diagnosis? If so, why aren’t you proceeding with therapy or treatment designed for that diagnosis? Are not mental ailments comparable in some regards to physical ailments. - like your brain cancer, which you sought and completed treatment.

If it’s cost related or if you’re already on some NHS waiting list, then ignore the top bit and forgive my ignorance.

In my opinion, Jordan Peterson’s early work and the 12 rules book are great. When he stays in his lane of psychology, he’s a great educator. He gets in trouble when he strays out of it, and his brain seems to have been fried from the drug use and from fighting woke mobs. I don’t see anything objectionable when people defer to him for psychological claims or self help.

MontyCallay101~8M

On categorising and defining oneself via mental illnesses - I think it makes a lot of sense to consider a lot of diagnoses as syndromes (clusters of correlated symptoms that we've decided to call X) rather than as prescriptive conditions. Considering ADHD, for instance, you could draw a normal distribution of people by ability to concentrate and define a certain cutoff for a "pathological" level of attention deficit. The word ADHD doesn't have any necessary meaning beyond what we've defined it to mean (which we've done so that one may, ideally, receive help for it through the medical system). Something like autism is different in that it's a specific developmental disorder that usually manifests very early in childhood. If your childhood development was, beyond your history of parental abuse, mostly normal in that regard, I wouldn't worry about it too much.

I would say I am critical of the trend of incorporating psychological/psyciatric diagnoses as defining parts of one's identity when their material impact is often minor. Putting yourself in a box doesn't necessarily solve the problems you have beyond giving you the idea of something specific to cope with.

Regarding advice-giving and listening reasurringly - there's a time for both, of course. If you're telling your counsellor about a specific problem (for instance, if you had a fight with someone and it upset you), then of course they shouldn't take sides and/or tell you exactly what to do. But any kind of therapeutic programme beyond that wants to enable you to develop strategies to actively deal with your problems - hence why it's called CBT, not Cognitive Listening Therapy.

In lieu of too much concrete advice-giving of my own I will say that when reading some of these posts it's overwhelming how much they're coloured by your negative self-perception, hopelessness and general depression. These aren't exactly conditions that improve your ability to accurately judge your own situation to your best interests and act accordingly. If that's just how you feel in the moment, and then you write a cathartic blog post and that improves it, then great! But it seems to be a more chronic problem than that.

If there's one thing beyond that I would say that stands out to me, it's that for someone who considers themselves to be open to experience you seem very closed-minded in a lot of your experiences. I've found it helpful to approach things with a mindset that one day you may develop traits or come to appreciate things you never thought you’d enjoy. People change throughout their lives. It’s important to be true to yourself, but not to the point where you become locked in place and dismiss anything new or different with “No, that’s not who I am.”

I would say I am critical of the trend of incorporating psychological/psyciatric diagnoses as defining parts of one's identity when their material impact is often minor. Putting yourself in a box doesn't necessarily solve the problems you have beyond giving you the idea of something specific to cope with.

Regarding advice-giving and listening reasurringly - there's a time for both, of course. If you're telling your counsellor about a specific problem (for instance, if you had a fight with someone and it upset you), then of course they shouldn't take sides and/or tell you exactly what to do. But any kind of therapeutic programme beyond that wants to enable you to develop strategies to actively deal with your problems - hence why it's called CBT, not Cognitive Listening Therapy.

In lieu of too much concrete advice-giving of my own I will say that when reading some of these posts it's overwhelming how much they're coloured by your negative self-perception, hopelessness and general depression. These aren't exactly conditions that improve your ability to accurately judge your own situation to your best interests and act accordingly. If that's just how you feel in the moment, and then you write a cathartic blog post and that improves it, then great! But it seems to be a more chronic problem than that.

If there's one thing beyond that I would say that stands out to me, it's that for someone who considers themselves to be open to experience you seem very closed-minded in a lot of your experiences. I've found it helpful to approach things with a mindset that one day you may develop traits or come to appreciate things you never thought you’d enjoy. People change throughout their lives. It’s important to be true to yourself, but not to the point where you become locked in place and dismiss anything new or different with “No, that’s not who I am.”

Laprilla14~8M

To be honest, I wondered if I was being annoying. I'm kind of bad at knowing, and I try not to assume or jump to conclusions, so it's nice to be told kind of bluntly.

I personally like the idea of a post that explains all this to avoid repeats of the same conversation. If I had read something like that, I probably would've kept my armchair diagnoses to myself. ^_^' Which maybe I should've done anyway.

I do have a tendency to offer solutions rather than listening. I want to get better about it, but I'm fighting my own nature there, so it's kind of difficult. But I'm sure I can learn to be better about it. I might just end up being very quiet, though.

Tama_Yoshi82~8M

On pathologizing:

It's become a part of mental health discussions in the mainstream, with people self-diagnosing and coming up with all kinds of issues for themselves, often without rigor or diagnosis, often TO others (I knew a girl doing a PhD in psych, who went on a tangent about how men repressed their emotions, I explained I found the conversation sometimes blind to people like me, who were very externally stoic, while still being very emotionally aware; she assured me that I had problems with repressed emotions and would benefit from seeing a therapist. I argued I had no shame in feeling emotions, and that I often introspected about them, internally. She remained adamant. It was very strange)! As an outsider who's interested psychotherapy, and as a "weird one" myself, I sometimes get to ask myself whether I have one thing or another. Recently it was ADD, which I learned had the hyper-focus thing, which is why sometimes people mistake it with autism. And then the "weirdness" can transpose into social ostracization, which can manifest in being socially inadequate, which then also looks like autism, or social anxiety, and so on. It's interesting how these things can bleed into one another, and only a more causal and holistic look at it can give a better idea.

On advice:

I've probably iterated on this at some point. Advice giving seems like a common-sense approach; person has problem, you have possible solution. A more subtle question is, why is it so often a bad idea, and why would counsellors and therapists be so averse to it. How can we fix someone without giving advice? From experience, I think it's not *quite* that people need connection more than they need actual advice. Rather, it's more that people are *really complicated*. Not everyone is closed to advice, though such people sometimes go on questionable tangents, finding random inappropriate advice online and applying it to negative effects, sometimes even believing it actually fixed their problem.

It's a bit like if a Spiritual Guru walked to my door and told me he could fix all of my problems through some secret meditation technique. Some people would presumably appreciate it. Most won't. I would go: "But you don't know anything about me."

It's especially tricky with this blog, since it's easy to presume we have enough information to diagnose/advise/etc.. I was trying to toe the line in my last comments. I have no idea if I succeeded! Not enough information! You did like my comment though so I guess it wasn't a horrible experience!

Counselors and therapists don't give advice because they recognize the complexity in human experiences, and recognize what isn't enough information - that most solutions must come from the patient (though sometimes a concrete solution can be provided). It's interesting to me that those professionals usually take on a "mirroring" approach (I feel sad. Why do you feel sad? Because I'm a failure. How are you a failure? etc.).

I've never had someone mirror me like this (never took therapy), though I often do this to myself, in my own head, and I end up wondering whether that counts as therapy minus the expertise. Would the therapist see something I don't? What would that even be?

Incidentally, there are few social circumstances where mirroring can at all be done. Friends will not do this. Family will not do this. Colleagues will not do this. You can't do this on most social platforms. Even in real-time platforms, you lack the visual cues from the other, and it can get quite limiting if the person is poor at expressing themselves through text (personal experience talking to mentally ill people).

I know mirroring can be helpful without the expertise though. Bizarrely, one of the earliest successful chatbots used such a mirroring technique. It was called ELIZA, made in 1967 no less. It was fairly primitive, though was efficient enough at picking emotional vocabulary to reformulate what was told to them in a mirroring response. The research on ELIZA showed spending time with the chatbot made people feel better. Who knew!

For this blog, I imagine there are those who think they can give advice (fail to see the complexity), those who share common experiences (emotional support), and those who can't really do either (I'm in the latter bucket most of the time). It's difficult to hear the emotional support in analytical conversations, the way I like them, so I find myself often unsure what my approach even ought to be, though I know a comment is more comforting than a view! I hope this makes you feel less lonely.

(feel free not to read the last bit, though I wouldn't be writing anything if it sounded like an attack): On Jordan Peterson

People didn't attack you on discord, though they lamented his controversial facets and worried about your exposure to him. I wasn't worried about it, personally. Others were just wondering what the "fuss" was about. Answers were provided. In an attempt to calm the concerns, I said something along those lines: a part of JBP's content is giving life advice and experiences which people easily relate to, from his background in psychology. Other parts of him are really controversial, and I imagine you would find those objectionable, and perhaps even frustrating!
Similarly, there would probably have been worry hearing the receptionist bring it up, but I can't imagine it breaking into an argument or anything. My personal approach is to redirect them to DrK/HealthyGamerGG, who I think is a better Jordan Peterson.

On pathologizing:

It's become a part of mental health discussions in the mainstream, with people self-diagnosing and coming up with all kinds of issues for themselves, often without rigor or diagnosis, often TO others (I knew a girl doing a PhD in psych, who went on a tangent about how men repressed their emotions, I explained I found the conversation sometimes blind to people like me, who were very externally stoic, while still being very emotionally aware; she assured me that I had problems with repressed emotions and would benefit from seeing a therapist. I argued I had no shame in feeling emotions, and that I often introspected about them, internally. She remained adamant. It was very strange)! As an outsider who's interested psychotherapy, and as a "weird one" myself, I sometimes get to ask myself whether I have one thing or another. Recently it was ADD, which I learned had the hyper-focus thing, which is why sometimes people mistake it with autism. And then the "weirdness" can transpose into social ostracization, which can manifest in being socially inadequate, which then also looks like autism, or social anxiety, and so on. It's interesting how these things can bleed into one another, and only a more causal and holistic look at it can give a better idea.

On advice:

I've probably iterated on this at some point. Advice giving seems like a common-sense approach; person has problem, you have possible solution. A more subtle question is, why is it so often a bad idea, and why would counsellors and therapists be so averse to it. How can we fix someone without giving advice? From experience, I think it's not *quite* that people need connection more than they need actual advice. Rather, it's more that people are *really complicated*. Not everyone is closed to advice, though such people sometimes go on questionable tangents, finding random inappropriate advice online and applying it to negative effects, sometimes even believing it actually fixed their problem.

It's a bit like if a Spiritual Guru walked to my door and told me he could fix all of my problems through some secret meditation technique. Some people would presumably appreciate it. Most won't. I would go: "But you don't know anything about me."

It's especially tricky with this blog, since it's easy to presume we have enough information to diagnose/advise/etc.. I was trying to toe the line in my last comments. I have no idea if I succeeded! Not enough information! You did like my comment though so I guess it wasn't a horrible experience!

Counselors and therapists don't give advice because they recognize the complexity in human experiences, and recognize what isn't enough information - that most solutions must come from the patient (though sometimes a concrete solution can be provided). It's interesting to me that those professionals usually take on a "mirroring" approach (I feel sad. Why do you feel sad? Because I'm a failure. How are you a failure? etc.).

I've never had someone mirror me like this (never took therapy), though I often do this to myself, in my own head, and I end up wondering whether that counts as therapy minus the expertise. Would the therapist see something I don't? What would that even be?

Incidentally, there are few social circumstances where mirroring can at all be done. Friends will not do this. Family will not do this. Colleagues will not do this. You can't do this on most social platforms. Even in real-time platforms, you lack the visual cues from the other, and it can get quite limiting if the person is poor at expressing themselves through text (personal experience talking to mentally ill people).

I know mirroring can be helpful without the expertise though. Bizarrely, one of the earliest successful chatbots used such a mirroring technique. It was called ELIZA, made in 1967 no less. It was fairly primitive, though was efficient enough at picking emotional vocabulary to reformulate what was told to them in a mirroring response. The research on ELIZA showed spending time with the chatbot made people feel better. Who knew!

For this blog, I imagine there are those who think they can give advice (fail to see the complexity), those who share common experiences (emotional support), and those who can't really do either (I'm in the latter bucket most of the time). It's difficult to hear the emotional support in analytical conversations, the way I like them, so I find myself often unsure what my approach even ought to be, though I know a comment is more comforting than a view! I hope this makes you feel less lonely.

(feel free not to read the last bit, though I wouldn't be writing anything if it sounded like an attack): On Jordan Peterson

People didn't attack you on discord, though they lamented his controversial facets and worried about your exposure to him. I wasn't worried about it, personally. Others were just wondering what the "fuss" was about. Answers were provided. In an attempt to calm the concerns, I said something along those lines: a part of JBP's content is giving life advice and experiences which people easily relate to, from his background in psychology. Other parts of him are really controversial, and I imagine you would find those objectionable, and perhaps even frustrating!
Similarly, there would probably have been worry hearing the receptionist bring it up, but I can't imagine it breaking into an argument or anything. My personal approach is to redirect them to DrK/HealthyGamerGG, who I think is a better Jordan Peterson.

LotBlind53~8M

Here's something that sprang to mind: did you consider writing an FAQ and linking to that in every post or every mental health post to avoid people suggesting the same stuff again?

Tobias 1115~8M

That was my original plan for what this post would be, though I got thrown off by the Discord discussion I briefly saw immediately after waking up.