Most of my life I have been an attentive, giving and generous man. At 60, I’m surprised at how self-centered have become.
At 41 I’m surprised by how much more self confident I have become. I still remember what it felt like being the insecure girl I was in high school, but it’s so obvious to me now that the things I was afraid of then were silly. I wish I had worried less and enjoyed life more back then, but I’m glad I have come as far as I have. I wonder when I look back in another 25 years if I’ll feel just as foreign to myself at 41.
54, that I’m still here.
41 and I’m surprised I’m not more crazy spending as much time alone as I do
I became a dad at 43, not what I expected, and it is softening me in ways I always hoped for, and never thought I’d see. My family’s rage problem has to stop with me, he can’t see it.
That’s a hell of a thing to dive into and grab hold of: it cannot be successfully white-knuckled forever and you actually have to get to the root cause of it. Not impossible, not at all, but definitely uncomfortable. Worth it, though. You have my sincere respect.
I am almost constantly amazed that, given how I lived up to the age of 40, I am somehow still alive. Conversely, I am appalled that I have survived to see the resurgence of fascism.
That I am stress free and happy. I spent most of my life being stressed out as hell, worrying any mistake I made would ruin my life and I’d be homeless.
It’s weird because all my peers are getting way more stressed and unhappy as they age. I can’t really relate to them anymore.
What is your secret?
save money. make good choices that provide you with long term benefit, exercise your body and mind. ignore short term impulses and invest in yourself, not other people. build your future day by day, don’t hope that it magically comes one day.
and ignore other people. way too many people are obsessed with what other people think of them and trying to impress them, and that’s why they make themselves miserable doing shit that is harmful to their well being.
every miserable/anxious person i meet is always obsessing about what other people think about them and trying to impress strangers and feels like they are ‘struggling’ because they aren’t as rich as somebody else. constantly agonizing over this or that meaningless brass ring they are chasing that will just leave them seeking another one.
Just how alone I’ve made myself. I had many opportunities for it not be this way, yet here I am.
It’s probably not that I’m surprised by myself - because being me is my normal - but rather other people acting differently that surprises me, as it highlights the difference between us. The first thing that comes to mind is my seeming incapability to get angry at things or people. I just don’t tend to feel much extreme emotion, and it’s so odd seeing other people lashing out. Online it’s different, as I just assume that those people are kids with undeveloped brains who write those angry comments on political threads especially, but I often see adults acting that way in real life too, and it just boggles my mind how someone can get to that age and still completely lack the ability to control their emotions.
I’m like you, it’s like I just don’t care.
It doesn’t sound like you are controlling your emotions. You said you don’t tend to feel extreme emotions. Is it surprising to you that others feel big emotions, or do you feel big ones yourself you just ate able to control or repress them?
If we focus on negative emotions, the ones like irritation or anxiety are more sneaky. I don’t tend to notice them the moment they arise, and when I finally do, they’ve already poisoned my mind and it’s much harder to get rid of them. Anger, on the other hand, is such an immediate and strong emotion that there’s nothing sneaky about it. It won’t go undetected but rather acts as this kind of mindfulness alarm. The moment anger arises, my mind shines this spotlight on it and it loses meaning and kind of just vanishes. If I, say, make a big mistake or break something, the anger does arise, but I immediately realize that it already happened and getting angry over it is just additional negativity on top of an already bad situation, and I then just let go of it. It’s not that I repress it but rather I simply just don’t feed it. You can’t really stay angry for much longer than seconds unless you start telling yourself a story to maintain that anger. It’s mostly optional.
I was pretty hardcore straight edge in college. Now I drink more days than I don’t.
I’m surprised I’m still around
42, how quickly my taste in foods is changing. Things I never liked before are now delicious
This is the day I labeled myself ‘old.’
I was feeling a bit hungry, but couldn’t decide what i wanted to for a snack.
Peanut butter and jelly. No
Sausage and pepper hero? No
Pancakes? No
Sardines and raw onions. Hell yes! And wash it down with a coffee soda!
Can you elaborate on the coffee soda? Is that just if you mix coffee and soda?
https://www.manhattanspecial.com/
It’s a local New York City product. I remember seeing the old Italian men drinking it on the bocce courts.
It’s much better than any energy drink, imho.
I’m surprised by how much I know. It perhaps shouldn’t be surprising given that I have both autism and ADHD and that makes me enthusiastic about learning basically everything, but I’m chuffed with how well rounded my knowledge is.
I studied biochemistry at university, but over the last 5 years or so, I’ve been doing a lot more reading in topics like the history and philosophy of science, philosophy more generally, political theory, disability theory, queer theory, economics, design, programming etc… My knowledge in each of these areas is relatively shallow, but I seem to be pretty good at forming lateral links between things I know, which means I can be quite fun to have in depth discussions with. It helps that I got a hell of a lot smarter when I stopped being so attached to my identity as a smart person and learned how to say “no, I haven’t heard of $thing, tell me more” or “I think I’ve heard of that, but I’m not sure — remind me?”
A year or so ago, a friend who studied English called me “well read” and it gave me a bit of an existential crisis. “But I don’t actually fully read most of the books I talk about. Many of them I just skim them until I find a chapter or two that’s most useful to me!”. Turns out that that kind of reading strategy is typical of people who are well read.
My late best friend was a historian, and one of the things I loved about our friendship is arguing with him about random shit. His background meant he often approached an issue in a completely different way to me, and we’d often ask questions or make points that would require the other to go away and think about it for a while before forming a response. I think he’d be really proud of me (and also aggravatingly smug due to him being a significant driving force behind me getting more into history).
That I look ancient. My family tends to be well preserved, but I got chronically ill and look 10 years too old.
I’m surprised at how much more methodic and organized I’ve become. Taking notes to get thoughts out of my head helps me reduce brain clutter.
Turning chores into pleasurable activities (podcasts while cleaning or cooking) also helped.
I’ve also grown more patient with other people’s actions. People don’t usually act with malice, more often it is just plain inability.
Also, very little fucks remain to be given.
