That is a question I have been pondering a lot lately. What constitutes a person being "normal"?
I've been thinking about this so much because my brain doctor has been comparing me to that word a lot lately. I've been seeing him for a few months now and the insight and observations I've been given have helped me tremendously. It's amazing how someone who is not you, and who is not close to you, can see so much by being completely objective as to just the facts of your life and events that ensue.
Well, two weeks ago he dropped a bomb on me that I was not prepared for. It was one of those 'that could never be me' moments. But, as I've been thinking about it, it is totally me. Looking back on the eight years of my life that I've felt this way, I can see and know that what he told me is true. When I outline my life and lay it out in front of me, I can see a nasty pattern, and it continues to repeat itself without my complete awareness. On a scale from one to bad, I'm in the middle so it could be worse. That always makes a girl (me) feel better. What's funny is that as time goes on and I continue to live, if I don't make some changes, I will forever feel this way that I feel. What's also funny is that this whole time, I thought that this is just life and that's the way life is. My perception of reality was and is completely askew. But, for me this is normal, this is life, my life, and I've never known anything different.
So again I ask, what is normal? If things have never been any other way and you don't know any different, isn't that normal? People are all so different, who's to say what's messed up and what's not. For all I know everyone has some form of disorder that makes them unique. We just don't know what disorder it is. We all have to deal with the cards we were dealt, whether we want to or not. You are the only one that can make your life your own and learn to live it the best way you can and you do that with what you have. If you have some mental issues, physical issues, or issues you don't even know about, you take what you have and you make life the best it can be.
My doc asked if I wanted to hear what his prediction of my life would be at age 50 if I didn't set some things straight. I told him to go for it and what I heard scared the crap out of me. It wasn't because I though his prediction would come true because that's what he thought, it was because I could actually see and know that what he said was right. I could see it and I did not like what I saw.
Now I'm on a quest to learn to harness my energy in the most positive ways possible. Learn how to be "normal" so I can have a decent, hopefully long life. Why does everything have to be such a fight?!! I don't know, but nothing good ever came out of giving up. At least that's what I've heard.
As my good friend Dag Hammarskjold once said (or maybe twice, who knows):
Life only demands from you the strength you possess. Only one feat is possible - not to have run away.
