Days 141-142: Fear of teenagers

09-10022013

Quote from Days 135-136: Masters and servants:

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to fear that teenagers will react to my behavior, choices and self-expression with ridicule because when I was a teenager and my social surroundings mostly consisted of other teenagers I experienced teenagers to generally be demeaning, abusive and hateful.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to not question this stereotype of teenagers that I have created in the past with my limited understanding of causality (why these teenagers act in a demeaning, abusive and hateful way).

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to believe that teenagers are demeaning, abusive and hateful by “nature” because they are going through a demanding period in their life.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to excuse teenagers to act in a demeaning, abusive and hateful way because I have believed it is their “nature” because of the demanding period they are living through.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to justify abusive behavior with demanding circumstances, not realizing that abusive behavior is never justified.

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I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to fear teenagers.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to fear that a teenager will attack me simply because he/she is a teenager, believing that just being a teenager is enough of a proof of one's hostility.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to believe age defines who a person is and where they stand in their process.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to define all people within a certain period of physical growth to be hostile by nature because of their age-related culture (group-determined behavior), the clash with other cultures (adults and children), physiological changes (growth, hormones, puberty) and mental changes (information accumulating; brain capacity and cognitive skills growing) – not realizing that everyone progresses at their individual speed and that one cannot determine where a specific individual stands by looking at their physiological age alone.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to guess, assume, interpret, believe and think a person to be a certain way based on their physiological age, not realizing this is not actual information but my perception which is not the reality no matter how accurate a guess it might be.

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I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself, when and as I walked towards the bus stop and saw three teenagers standing there, to instantly assume they are like the teenage stereotype I have assembled in my mind and to then react with fear to this mind image according to which all teenagers are hostile abusers – not realizing this fear is not based on what's HERE as I know nothing of the three people on the bus stop but is instead based on the image inside my mind which is not an equivalent of reality – and then approach them and position myself on the bus stop according to this state of “preparedness” (being ready to dodge, escape or counter-attack if I'm attacked).

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to see myself as inferior to the three girls next to me on the bus stop when the young boy asked for fire from them and not from me – instantly interpreting the lack of action (no approach towards me – I was left alone – to me nothing happened) to “mean” that there is something wrong with me and that the girls were somehow better than me – not realizing that I do not know why the boy chose to ask for fire from the people next to me (he might have even been scared of me because I'm older) and that simply from this lack of action I cannot conclude anything about his motives.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to react to and defend myself from this experience of inferiority by going into a “what if” scenario where I imagined what would have happened if the boy had asked me for the fire – here actually hiding the initial point of inferiority (fear) so that I wouldn't have to face it and deal with it.

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I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to fear teenage girls because I perceive them to “win” in terms of looks (clothing, make-up, prettiness, imago), because when I was a teenager and surrounded by other teenagers I was always the one who “lost” in terms of looks and because I then created a mental image of teenage girls as stereotypically focused on their looks and in that sense always “winning” as compared to me.

• I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself as a child/teenager to adapt to what my environment taught me about “the importance of looks” and “the relationship game” and believe I needed to look a certain way to be good enough, successful and accepted.
• I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to reinforce this belief by participating in the culture of complimenting others for their looks, not realizing that these compliments were said through envy as in “I wish I was as pretty as you”.
• I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to feel good, successful, accepted and empowered when someone gave me a compliment on my looks, believing these to be necessary boosts to my self-esteem and self-confidence – not realizing that by craving for compliments I was not actually building myself to be a confident being standing on its own two feet but a being that is always reliant on the acceptance of others.
• I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself as a child/teenager to compare myself to the other girls in terms of looks and perceive myself to not look “as good as them” ( = not as close to the beauty ideal as they apparently were) and to then create an experience of inferiority through this comparison and feel like I was “less than” others – not realizing that this comparison was never valid because I did not understand I was functioning within a culture of worshipping images and that to worship images does not follow the principle “what is best for all life” because images aren't life as these moving three-dimensional organisms but as a two-dimensional snapshot of it – and that to live within the culture of worshipping images and trying to become like the images (“the image of god”) is to live according to self-interest, not the interest of all.
• I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to envy another who is getting complimented for their looks, reacting to the lack of compliments for myself, believing that if another gets compliments I must be the one “losing”.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to hold on to a stereotype I created over ten years ago, not realizing that as I do this I hold on to who I was over ten years ago and stop myself from moving on and actually changing.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to fear teenage boys because as a teenager I was desperate for their attention so I could validate my self-worth and thus created a fear of them in terms of “what if he refuses me” because that would mean I am worth nothing - I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to not realize I still hold on to this belief and react with fear around teenage boys because their attention is somehow “special” - not realizing this is just a remnant of my past attitudes, desires, fears and beliefs and that it has no base in who I am now.

• I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself as a child/teenager to adapt to what my environment taught me about the “relationship game” and how looks were apparently very essential in this game, and thus believe that I needed to get validation from boys/men that I was attractive enough (good enough / worthy) and that I could help myself “win” this attention by focusing on my looks and trying to look “good” (trying to look like the beauty ideal).
• I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to carry this attitude towards teenage boys onto my present day even though I no longer believe that my looks define me or that I need validation from boys/men – because I still fear rejection above many things and take it personally, not taking into account that I do not know the actual experience of the one “rejecting” me nor do I consider how I create my experience of “being rejected”.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to fear that teenagers will attack me by insulting me in a personal way because this is what the people around me did a lot when I was a teenager and because I have reinforced this fear as an adult by looking at how teenagers behave and interpreting it to be the same as what I experienced it to be as a teen.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to categorize an age group based on my initial experience of its members – not realizing that in fact no categories exist, as there is only Life as everything that exists on this planet / in this universe – and that categorizing is a tool of the mind that can be used for both constructive and destructive means.

I commit myself to realize teenagers are just human beings, one and equal to me and everyone else.

When and as I react to the presence of a teenager with fear, I stop, I breathe and I realize that I am drawing up a stereotype I have created over a decade ago in the past when my perception was limited. I realize that these stereotypes serve no constructive purpose but only limit me from facing that which is actually here as another person. I realize that by looking at people as stereotypes I expect them to live according to that stereotype, and that by expecting another to live as something I only support them to live as that which I expect. I will then expect no less from the other than his/her full potential. I note the point which I reacted to, and if it is something else than reacting to the presence of a stereotype, I return to investigate it in writing.