Living a life of pretense

[stMarkus]

                   Every time I return home from a day of school or a day of being amongst people I feel a great relief like I can finally relax. The burden that I’ve been carrying all day can now be set aside but I still don’t feel free of it because I know that I really have no control over when and where I need to carry this unbearable weight.  Just a single look from someone reminds me that I need to pretend and hide myself and live a life that is not my own. I need to denounce everything I value and become and empty, boring, meaningless and shallow person.  I feel yet again all the humiliations from my brother, father, mother and grandmother saying what a worthless and meaningless person I am and in this moment that is exactly what I am. This feeling of not being in control over who I am and seeing myself turn into some kind of a hideous parody of what I want to be makes me want to scratch my eyes out and scream. The fear of expressing myself, of letting my real self be seen by everyone around me feels to me like definite suicide and so I am paralyzed by fear when I feel the urge to express myself. Instead of letting my thoughts and feelings be manifested in the world around me, I feel myself sinking deeper and deeper into isolation. I feel weak, hurt, scared and overpowered by the fake personality that always automatically assumes control over my being when I’m too scared of the world. I feel the fake personality mocking me and saying to me that I don’t deserve to live and the isolation, pain and suffering is exactly what I deserve. It fills me with intense, acute pain to see myself be controlled my something so corrupt and evil, to know that I’m hopelessly imprisoned in the same cage with that evil, corrupt, broken, dead being. These beings symbolize my family members who have managed to crawl into the deepest parts of myself and now I feel that they will forever be a part of me, that I can never be free of them. At the same time I see happy and free people around me, who know nothing about the suffering and imprisonment that is part of my life and I feel even more intensely the unfairness and tragedy of my situation when comparing it to everyone else’s.

                My choices right now seem to be to either keep pretending and hiding the reality of my life and history or entering into the world that I decided to escape from a long time ago. This is a world of anger, pain, loneliness, isolation, sense of worthlessness and total lack of control and of never-ending hopelessness. By now I’m so sick of pretending that I would do anything to find something real in myself and even if the real part of me is comprised of the aforementioned feelings, I will take it gladly. Therefore I choose suffering. I choose it because I believe it will lead me to something good, to love, to happiness, to satisfaction and enjoyment, whereas pretending will only lead to a life that is not mine and that is not a life at all. Sadly I still don’t feel any control over my life, like I’m living my own life, I still feel hopelessly chained to what my family needed me to be, I feel stuck. There seems to be nothing but hate, suffering and ridicule in the world for me and it feels utterly hopeless to chase any kind of happiness, empathy and understanding but I do want those things and there’s nothing else I want to do, but chase after them. I don’t really care whether they exist or not, I just know that I will never accept the fact that I will not find love in my life and I’ll always be working hard to achieve it.

            I think it lessens the feeling of isolation when I write something and upload it on the internet, where people might read it and possibly relate to it.

               

[TruthahnDerRuin]

I have had very similar thoughts for the past ten years or so. But I am having my perspective flipped on it's head after a dream interpretation meet-up I had recently. The dream was of me rolling a monster with a plastered on smile into a hole and then gaining the power of a magical fire that can consume whatever I choose. So whenever I have thought of revealing my real self it has felt like definite suicide. But is that my feeling? If I take off the smile mask I gain a fire that I can use to consume the falseness of others. If the people who surround me are mostly false self then provoking me is suicide for them and that is what I am feeling. This is a very recent change in perspective and I am unsure if it is justified.

A second unrelated point is that the people at the dream interpretation meet-up were more curious and accepting than most people I have met. I was able to take off the mask for a while. Perhaps you can find a similar group near where you live.

[Rick Horton]

 

                   Every time I return home from a day of school or a day of being amongst people I feel a great relief like I can finally relax. The burden that I’ve been carrying all day can now be set aside but I still don’t feel free of it because I know that I really have no control over when and where I need to carry this unbearable weight.  Just a single look from someone reminds me that I need to pretend and hide myself and live a life that is not my own. I need to denounce everything I value and become and empty, boring, meaningless and shallow person.  I feel yet again all the humiliations from my brother, father, mother and grandmother saying what a worthless and meaningless person I am and in this moment that is exactly what I am. This feeling of not being in control over who I am and seeing myself turn into some kind of a hideous parody of what I want to be makes me want to scratch my eyes out and scream. The fear of expressing myself, of letting my real self be seen by everyone around me feels to me like definite suicide and so I am paralyzed by fear when I feel the urge to express myself. Instead of letting my thoughts and feelings be manifested in the world around me, I feel myself sinking deeper and deeper into isolation. I feel weak, hurt, scared and overpowered by the fake personality that always automatically assumes control over my being when I’m too scared of the world. I feel the fake personality mocking me and saying to me that I don’t deserve to live and the isolation, pain and suffering is exactly what I deserve. It fills me with intense, acute pain to see myself be controlled my something so corrupt and evil, to know that I’m hopelessly imprisoned in the same cage with that evil, corrupt, broken, dead being. These beings symbolize my family members who have managed to crawl into the deepest parts of myself and now I feel that they will forever be a part of me, that I can never be free of them. At the same time I see happy and free people around me, who know nothing about the suffering and imprisonment that is part of my life and I feel even more intensely the unfairness and tragedy of my situation when comparing it to everyone else’s.

                My choices right now seem to be to either keep pretending and hiding the reality of my life and history or entering into the world that I decided to escape from a long time ago. This is a world of anger, pain, loneliness, isolation, sense of worthlessness and total lack of control and of never-ending hopelessness. By now I’m so sick of pretending that I would do anything to find something real in myself and even if the real part of me is comprised of the aforementioned feelings, I will take it gladly. Therefore I choose suffering. I choose it because I believe it will lead me to something good, to love, to happiness, to satisfaction and enjoyment, whereas pretending will only lead to a life that is not mine and that is not a life at all. Sadly I still don’t feel any control over my life, like I’m living my own life, I still feel hopelessly chained to what my family needed me to be, I feel stuck. There seems to be nothing but hate, suffering and ridicule in the world for me and it feels utterly hopeless to chase any kind of happiness, empathy and understanding but I do want those things and there’s nothing else I want to do, but chase after them. I don’t really care whether they exist or not, I just know that I will never accept the fact that I will not find love in my life and I’ll always be working hard to achieve it.

            I think it lessens the feeling of isolation when I write something and upload it on the internet, where people might read it and possibly relate to it.

               

 

You need to have a talk with your inner critic and set him straight.

[Gojira]

I completely sympathise with you, mrkuz. I have a similar, if not the same, problem and it has become even more of a burden than it was at any previous point in my life, or so it feels.

My home is like a sanctuary to me in a way because it is a place to where I can retreat, hide away, be myself and recharge. So it is no wonder why I never go out except for when I have to go to work or go to the shop or something of the like. I am always extremely conscious of my performance while around others and if I feel I have performed poorly then I will proceed to beat myself up, metaphorically speaking, for hours and hours after, and this leads to all kinds of self-destructive thoughts. I always feel something is expected of me, especially in social situations. I tend to try to blend in, not saying a lot and only responding, often in a forced way, when people engage with me. I try to speak their "language", forcing myself to say something so as to not appear rude and many times it left me with a bad taste in my mouth because it simply was not me and so I feel that I betrayed myself and so begins more self-loathing. Many times I go to work telling myself that I will just be myself and not worry about what others think of me, and not get stressed or anxious but when I get there and the night moves along I find myself defaulting back to that mentality. In my mind I try to deny that I feel these, deny my fear and weakness and can almost pretend that these problems are non-existant, and certainly this is what I try to show to others around me. I could go on and write essays on this but I don't have the energy.

 

[J. Robles]

 

                   Every time I return home from a day of school or a day of being amongst people I feel a great relief like I can finally relax. The burden that I’ve been carrying all day can now be set aside but I still don’t feel free of it because I know that I really have no control over when and where I need to carry this unbearable weight.  Just a single look from someone reminds me that I need to pretend and hide myself and live a life that is not my own. I need to denounce everything I value and become and empty, boring, meaningless and shallow person.  I feel yet again all the humiliations from my brother, father, mother and grandmother saying what a worthless and meaningless person I am and in this moment that is exactly what I am. This feeling of not being in control over who I am and seeing myself turn into some kind of a hideous parody of what I want to be makes me want to scratch my eyes out and scream. The fear of expressing myself, of letting my real self be seen by everyone around me feels to me like definite suicide and so I am paralyzed by fear when I feel the urge to express myself. Instead of letting my thoughts and feelings be manifested in the world around me, I feel myself sinking deeper and deeper into isolation. I feel weak, hurt, scared and overpowered by the fake personality that always automatically assumes control over my being when I’m too scared of the world. I feel the fake personality mocking me and saying to me that I don’t deserve to live and the isolation, pain and suffering is exactly what I deserve. It fills me with intense, acute pain to see myself be controlled my something so corrupt and evil, to know that I’m hopelessly imprisoned in the same cage with that evil, corrupt, broken, dead being. These beings symbolize my family members who have managed to crawl into the deepest parts of myself and now I feel that they will forever be a part of me, that I can never be free of them. At the same time I see happy and free people around me, who know nothing about the suffering and imprisonment that is part of my life and I feel even more intensely the unfairness and tragedy of my situation when comparing it to everyone else’s.

                My choices right now seem to be to either keep pretending and hiding the reality of my life and history or entering into the world that I decided to escape from a long time ago. This is a world of anger, pain, loneliness, isolation, sense of worthlessness and total lack of control and of never-ending hopelessness. By now I’m so sick of pretending that I would do anything to find something real in myself and even if the real part of me is comprised of the aforementioned feelings, I will take it gladly. Therefore I choose suffering. I choose it because I believe it will lead me to something good, to love, to happiness, to satisfaction and enjoyment, whereas pretending will only lead to a life that is not mine and that is not a life at all. Sadly I still don’t feel any control over my life, like I’m living my own life, I still feel hopelessly chained to what my family needed me to be, I feel stuck. There seems to be nothing but hate, suffering and ridicule in the world for me and it feels utterly hopeless to chase any kind of happiness, empathy and understanding but I do want those things and there’s nothing else I want to do, but chase after them. I don’t really care whether they exist or not, I just know that I will never accept the fact that I will not find love in my life and I’ll always be working hard to achieve it.

            I think it lessens the feeling of isolation when I write something and upload it on the internet, where people might read it and possibly relate to it.

               

 

Hey Mrkuz

I am sorry you’re going through such pain. I have to say it takes big balls not only for you to write this out for yourself, but also to put it on the web. I say to you sir, bravo. Not only that but your will to fight against that which has suffocated you from probably your childhood, the things you mentioned like anger, loneliness, lack of control, etc. I am interested in how you’re handling your situation. I have been able to understand my situation but haven’t been the best and expressing it myself. I know personally these past couple years felt like I have woken myself up from a comma and finally accepted the way things were in my life. I know I have a ways a way to get to where I want to be, but like you no matter the struggle it’s definitely better where I’m headed than where I was at.

I can sympathize with what I guess what we might share in common. Having to put the mask of pretense to facilitate the empty vapid or parasitic whims of people that you ought to love and treasure because their your family but, they can treat you worse than people you come into contact with like friends, acquaintances, etc. I won’t prattle on how my situation is. What’s your situation like? Do you live with your family? What do you do to avoid these feelings; do you write like this or do something to keep you busy? And I know this last question might be a bit personal, but when was the moment where you said this to yourself for the first time, that you were not going to put up with the pretense anymore? You don’t have to answer anything if you don’t want to. I would understand.

Anyways hope you’re feeling a bit better and doing better since the date you posted this.

[J. Robles]

 

                   Every time I return home from a day of school or a day of being amongst people I feel a great relief like I can finally relax. The burden that I’ve been carrying all day can now be set aside but I still don’t feel free of it because I know that I really have no control over when and where I need to carry this unbearable weight.  Just a single look from someone reminds me that I need to pretend and hide myself and live a life that is not my own. I need to denounce everything I value and become and empty, boring, meaningless and shallow person.  I feel yet again all the humiliations from my brother, father, mother and grandmother saying what a worthless and meaningless person I am and in this moment that is exactly what I am. This feeling of not being in control over who I am and seeing myself turn into some kind of a hideous parody of what I want to be makes me want to scratch my eyes out and scream. The fear of expressing myself, of letting my real self be seen by everyone around me feels to me like definite suicide and so I am paralyzed by fear when I feel the urge to express myself. Instead of letting my thoughts and feelings be manifested in the world around me, I feel myself sinking deeper and deeper into isolation. I feel weak, hurt, scared and overpowered by the fake personality that always automatically assumes control over my being when I’m too scared of the world. I feel the fake personality mocking me and saying to me that I don’t deserve to live and the isolation, pain and suffering is exactly what I deserve. It fills me with intense, acute pain to see myself be controlled my something so corrupt and evil, to know that I’m hopelessly imprisoned in the same cage with that evil, corrupt, broken, dead being. These beings symbolize my family members who have managed to crawl into the deepest parts of myself and now I feel that they will forever be a part of me, that I can never be free of them. At the same time I see happy and free people around me, who know nothing about the suffering and imprisonment that is part of my life and I feel even more intensely the unfairness and tragedy of my situation when comparing it to everyone else’s.

                My choices right now seem to be to either keep pretending and hiding the reality of my life and history or entering into the world that I decided to escape from a long time ago. This is a world of anger, pain, loneliness, isolation, sense of worthlessness and total lack of control and of never-ending hopelessness. By now I’m so sick of pretending that I would do anything to find something real in myself and even if the real part of me is comprised of the aforementioned feelings, I will take it gladly. Therefore I choose suffering. I choose it because I believe it will lead me to something good, to love, to happiness, to satisfaction and enjoyment, whereas pretending will only lead to a life that is not mine and that is not a life at all. Sadly I still don’t feel any control over my life, like I’m living my own life, I still feel hopelessly chained to what my family needed me to be, I feel stuck. There seems to be nothing but hate, suffering and ridicule in the world for me and it feels utterly hopeless to chase any kind of happiness, empathy and understanding but I do want those things and there’s nothing else I want to do, but chase after them. I don’t really care whether they exist or not, I just know that I will never accept the fact that I will not find love in my life and I’ll always be working hard to achieve it.

            I think it lessens the feeling of isolation when I write something and upload it on the internet, where people might read it and possibly relate to it.

               

 

Hey Mrkuz

I am sorry you’re going through such pain. I have to say it takes big balls not only for you to write this out for yourself, but also to put it on the web. I say to you sir, bravo. Not only that but your will to fight against that which has suffocated you from probably your childhood, the things you mentioned like anger, loneliness, lack of control, etc. I am interested in how you’re handling your situation. I have been able to understand my situation but haven’t been the best and expressing it myself. I know personally these past couple years felt like I have woken myself up from a comma and finally accepted the way things were in my life. I know I have a ways a way to get to where I want to be, but like you no matter the struggle it’s definitely better where I’m headed than where I was at.

I can sympathize with what I guess what we might share in common. Having to put the mask of pretense to facilitate the empty vapid or parasitic whims of people that you ought to love and treasure because their your family but, they can treat you worse than people you come into contact with like friends, acquaintances, etc. I won’t prattle on how my situation is. What’s your situation like? Do you live with your family? What do you do to avoid these feelings; do you write like this or do something to keep you busy? And I know this last question might be a bit personal, but when was the moment where you said this to yourself for the first time, that you were not going to put up with the pretense anymore? You don’t have to answer anything if you don’t want to. I would understand.

Anyways hope you’re feeling a bit better and doing better since the date you posted this.