A Few

chris_sawyer linked to this, so I have to as well:

Feeling rejected has surprising psychological consequences. The thing that gets me is not exactly what those consequences are, but the sensitivity of the button that triggers. Even if you hate someone in particular, knowing the feeling's mutual is enough to produce these responses. We're very social animals, it turns out, and our desire for company can be taken to a faulty extreme pretty easily.

Another fascinating idea is how rejected people engage in behaviors that make it *more* likely that they'll be rejected in the future, anti-social and aggressive. It's interesting how this overcompensation is essentially hard-wired into our brains. Which of course makes me think if there's any wonder we have so many maladjusted, weird people out there; if you make it through high school being mocked by most of the people in your world, what kind of adult does that make you when you get through it? Does it work on an even larger social scale? Is it possible that a sort of 'societal rejection' is one of the reasons why the poor or minorities tend to have higher instances of mental illness, criminal tendencies and the like? How far can you take this?

Obviously, this isn't the one answer that explains why a member of a marginalized community might do something morally reprehensible, and it's not an excuse, either. But it's a significant factor, and if it's something we can do something about, then...maybe it means the difference between eventually learning to become functional in a social group and, well, not.

I'm taking a Psychology 101 class this semester, so expect a lot more obnoxiously naive rants about the basics of how the human brain operates. I'm warning you now. :)

*****

This week was pretty bad in terms of mood. I kept bottoming out to a deeper layer of bad mood, and Wednesday was the worst I've felt in a long time. I got so tired of everything that I just wanted to sleep forever, which is a disturbing thing to me. It felt like I was moving through a thick fog with everything I did. I just wanted to be still, and be alone, and not have to move or think any more.

One thing that I think it's difficult to get across is how...automatic this process is. I obsess over friendships and interactions and being able to connect with people, and I know a lot of the time if I could just get out of my own way, chill out and take things as they come things would go a lot smoother. I *know* this, but I can't *do* it when I get depressed and insecure. It's another reason the 'rejection' article hit me so hard; what sounds neutral to most people will more than likely sound like rejection to me. If anything as simple as a facial expression or vocal inflection *might* be construed as something negative, chances are I'll take it that way and run with it.

And of course, this is ridiculous. I *know* it's ridiculous but I feel like I can't do a thing to change this reaction. Most of the time I'm aware of these processes, I know how they work, and sometimes I can ride them out; some other times it turns me into this completely different person. I'll be fine, and suddenly I'll feel like I'm teetering on the edge of this cliff, and then I'm down. It feels like something in my brain is depleted. If I had it, I could feel better, but I don't. I feel like a stalled car in the middle of the road. I don't want to be there, you don't *want* me to be there, but I can't help the situation at all. I'm just out of gas, and I'm stuck where I am until I get more.

In Radical Acceptance, the advice given seems to be to make peace with this mood; to observe it, to let it happen without any kind of qualitative judgment for it. That's a really great idea, but impossible to do when you're in the middle of work and trying to do four things at once, and you can barely muster up the energy to do any of it. It's very easy to feel overwhelmed, to feel like you're trapped and the only thing to do is to quit so you don't have to deal with any of it any more.

That sounds a lot worse than I mean it to. I'm not suicidal. I'm just trying to explain all of this craziness; at the very least, so it makes sense to myself. And to other people.

I also don't want to be the guy who talks endlessly about depression, and bores people with all of the minutiae of every single mood. Just bare with me through a few more of these and I'll try to start posting about other things. This is just new and shiny and it helps me sort out my brain. Also, your input is tremendously reassuring. :)

In Other News

Valentine's weekend is finally here; Ryan and I have exchanged the opening salvos of our presents. He surprised me at work with roses, and I sent him home with German chocolate cake baked (with love!) from a coworker.

Tomorrow night, dinner at Chez TJ in Mountain View, with various other activities scattered through the next couple of days.

This weekend is gonna *rock*. :)