genderjumper: cartoon giraffe, chewing greens, wearing cap & bells (Default)
I don't bother thinking very hard about the tension between free will and determinism unless I'm depressed and my usual self-regulation efforts aren't working. But it's rare that I start thinking about them without already noticing the depression and self-regulation stall.

This was not the week I thought I was going to have.
  • I got turned down for a job I really, really wanted. I trust that it's going to lead me to better things (or potentially I reapply later), but a lot of my cognitive load had been going to daydreaming about relocating and now it's not really sure where to go.
  • A trans woman died in my community. I had only met her once or twice: long enough to get a massive crush, not long enough to learn her last name. But I went to the grief circle tonight and offered what support I could to her grieving parents and others.
  • The friend I trust to be untrustworthy may be about to lose one parent to illness and another to the grief. I really wish people would call on a care coach or family diplomat during such difficult times. This particular friend just stormed off and probably got high.
  • Speaking of mental illness, when I started gray-rocking my fam-o about three years ago, I never would have imagined they would just stop participating. I have literally no idea what's happening over there right now, because they each started dealing with heavy shit and they simply do not know how to communicate out of anything other than idleness or overwhelm.
  • My ostensible dating partner and friend of 30+ years abruptly reconnected with an ex last week and derailed our plans to share physical space (which is a big deal because their family doesn't mask consistently so I have to build a lot of faith and request 5 days of relative isolation). I can't help worrying that some of this was sparked by their recent realization that I was going to move away sooner or later, but they are not strong at self-advocacy nor even certain kinds of self-awareness and I horrible at navigating the unspoken.
  • My planned road trip to visit hyper-cautious loved ones in central Texas did not happen because 2/3 of us got nasty spring colds (I allow for the fact it could have been COVID, but I have zero evidence and a lifetime of experience with allergies turning into sinus infections and it felt like the latter; that said, these things just plain heal more slowly than they did before my two cases of COVID).
  • Signs currently point to a new hypomania as I come out of sick-space: the excitement of the big change being redirected into staying calm combined with having been rather idle the past two weeks, so that's why I'm still up at 7am (I did have a 3-hour nap earlier, which is usually navigable for me) documenting some of the goings on instead of sleeping.
  • Have had a strong urge to write the past few days thanks to a writing group I'm co-leading, but I'm wavering between too much and too little to say.
  • My therapist wants to terminate after over ten years together because she has nothing left to teach me, I'm figuring it all out on my own. I agree it's time, but that doesn't mean I'm enthusiastic about it.
I should probably read the Tao or something contemplative, then try again to sleep.
genderjumper: cartoon giraffe, chewing greens, wearing cap & bells (Default)
Without going into the long version, suffice it to say I have a problematic relationship with leadership. As someone who is tall, male-ish, articulate, and white, I have often found myself elevated (dare I say privileged) in ways that did not necessarily match my skill set or even my emotional fitness for the moment. (It gets even more complicated when I step into such a role because I am qualified, but distrusting of my would-be followers because I haven't yet demonstrated why I'm a good fit.)

I posit that leadership (and by this I'm not sure if I mean all leadership or just leadership as I internalized it across my first 40ish years on this planet) is a parasocial relationship: people make assumptions about your knowledge, skills, and integrity, and then they may take it personally when you inevitably fail to live up to their expectations. They will sit quietly when you take a public stand, they will follow your tribulations without offering a comforting word, and they will pile up on you if the winds of popularity ever shift away from you.

As such, I have triggers around leadership... )

Anyway, a new direction recently emerged for me to consider:

A lover read my tarot and told me I needed to stop getting hung up on it and instead seek out a matriarchal leadership. And I love this idea but I have no idea how to operationalize it. (One of womanism's foundational documents puts forth the idea of a "luxocracy" -- leadership by light -- but I recall it as aspirational rather than practicable and found nothing useful.) I suppose all I have to go on so far is the handful of true leaders and heroes I've ever known and how they were always driven by their love and support of others -- reciprocated or not -- and a vague sense that matriarchal leadership is less likely to be recorded or celebrated in a holiday (which resonates nicely with the Tao Te Ching).

No idea where this inquiry will lead (or even begin), but figure I'll share it here in case ideas emerge...

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