My Strength is My Weakness
Just like Superman, the alien from the planet Krypton, the
very thing that makes me powerful is also my downfall. See, I unabashedly
believe in superpowers, and I think that we all have them. They are our innate
preferences; skills and talents that might seem mediocre at first, but when
cultivated, can become supernatural. Think of a powerful athlete that defies
what we think is possible for our bodies. Think of math geniuses, elite
musicians, and composers. There are also those people that appear “normal” to
the untrained eye, but possess energetic, internal talents that everyone around
them can attest to. Some are teachers; put on this earth to guide people
through the labyrinth of life. Some are healers; with the ability to work empathetically
with our life-source energy to heal, nourish and guide. Just like the X-Men had
an array of quirky characters, some people in our midst are just as gifted.
Some people are made of stone, in the sense that they are utterly unperturbed
by life’s rough sees. Some have magic shields that afford them an unwavering
optimism no matter how many blows they get dealt. Some are chameleon like in
their ability to adapt to ever-changing circumstances. Some have a force field
(what we know as a “strong personality”) around them that can blow people away,
or bend them to their will: for good or evil. We know so many people with
special abilities, and we also can see to what extent they have embraced those
abilities. Maybe we have a friend who uses her optimism simply to carry on
being a good administrative assistant, but we also know of the great optimists
that have fully cultivated their abilities and have made it their careers.
Martha Beck--a woman who has fully embraced her MANY superpowers--comes to mind.
But whether you have embraced your superpowers or not, you know deep down
inside what they are. We all do.
Our intuition is squashed from such a young age, we are all made
to feel alien for doing what comes naturally to us. Optimists are told to get
real, and that life is hard. Artists are told that they will be starving. We
are told not to get our hopes up. We are told, essentially, not to do what
feels right because the only actions deemed noble in this world are suffering,
and working hard at something you don’t enjoy. No wonder the world is in such a
mess. All the ills we see happening in the world are symptoms of this diseased
thinking. For as long as I can remember, I have never felt like I truly
belonged on planet earth. The funny thing is, most of us probably don’t.
I have felt like an alien for all of my life, until I met my
partner Chris. He is the first person to see right through my “skin suit” to
who I really am. He knows what my superpower is, and has encouraged me to
develop it, and learn to control it so that it doesn’t control me. Looking back
over my life, for as long as I can remember I have had the same superpower. It
has always served me well, but has also made me feel like an outsider. Except, as I learn to accept more of the “unseen” things in the world I realize that I
am indeed a weird little alien, but I am living among other weird little
aliens, and we are all pretending to be normal…whatever that is!
So, what is my superpower? Well…try not to laugh…it’s X-Ray
vision! No seriously, it is. I
don’t see through walls, I see through people, situations, and circumstances.
When I meet people, I get “a read” on most of them within a few minutes of
getting to know them. I also get clear insights into people’s motivations
sometimes. It is more than just their behaviors, although those often give them
away. The way they enter a room, watching to see who is watching them. The way
they speak to try to hide their insecurities. Their mannerisms; their tone; the
way they are around different people. The looks they give. All of this stuff
most people that are “good with people” can pick out. But I feel, for lack of a
better word, their energy. (If that word gives you hives, or engages
your eye roll response then it is probably best you stop reading. The rest of
this article is only going to get weirder.) It is so impossible for me to
describe what I feel sometimes with people, but what I can best describe it as
is psychic energy…as in…the vibes coming from their psyche/personality/thoughts
(whether unconscious or not).
When someone meets me that is threatened by my looks, it hits my like a brick wall.
When someone is uncomfortable in a social situation, I can feel the fidgety
energy. When someone is insecure I can taste the
bitter taste of insecurity. When someone is trying to control the
situation/conversation it is the worst because I start to vibrate, shiver and shake inside! It’s like
I can actually feel their energy trying to bend me to their will-whether they
realize they are doing it or not. Now imagine me trying to act normal while being
bombarded by these energies. It is exhausting! I mean, most people are giving
off some bad vibes at some point. We all feel insecure, or controlling, or restless
at times. In a crowded room (where even the most self-assured person's insecurities come out), it is bound to be a mixed bag energy and I can feel all of it. I have
found myself becoming more and more withdrawn lately since I have been
consciously developing my superpower. As my ability gets stronger, I find it
more and more intolerable to be around people and be bombarded by their issues.
I say “issues”, because when someone is giving off positive energy I just bask
in it unaffected, but when someone is having some sort of psychological
conflict I am hit with it...hard! Now isn’t it so funny that my Superpower is also
my Kryptonite? Actually, it’s a perfect design.
It is the age-old wisdom of the comic books that “with great
power comes great responsibility”, and that if we do not control our powers,
they will control us. Empathy and a natural ability to care for people can turn
into a life of servitude to others. Power, if wielded unwisely, will be your
downfall. Optimism, when used to mask real problems, can be destructive.
Imagination, when used to escape and hide instead of build and create, is just an addiction. Teaching can become preaching. Healing can become manipulation. In all
of our natural abilities lies our destruction. For me, having a front row seat
to other people’s issues not only makes me a hermit, but also makes it hard for
me to open up to some kinds of people. Mostly because my first response, without fail, is
to give them what they want out of the social interaction so that my suffering from feeling their
anxieties will stop! After that, not much energy is left for me to talk about myself. Especially when I can feel that they are so caught up in their own issues they don't really want to get to know me.
I have become quite the social chameleon. When I encounter that woman who is threatened by my looks, if I know I have to "be friendly" with her for a while I will instantly try to put her at ease by complementing her, and letting her feel that
she is better than me in some way by revealing an insecurity or fault. I dial
up my naïveté, and dial-down my exuberance. When I feel that someone is trying
to control the situation or conversation, I quiet right down and submit to her.
I nod a lot, and ask questions and say “oh really”—sometime as an exclamation
and sometimes as a question, but always in a way that lets them prattle on. Why don't I assert my points? Talk over them? MAKE them listen to me? Well, trying to compete with someone energetically is impossible for me. The more I
push, the more I intensify their controlling energy, which I can then feel magnified, so the worse I feel in return. Instead I nod and smile, while feeling myself vibrating faster and faster until I am shaking inside (and sometimes outside) with their dictatorial energy.
In
this way I feel totally incapacitated by this superpower. It has rendered me
lonely and almost anti-social. But, every now and then, I have a day where I
feel like nothing can touch me. I still feel all that energy, but instead of
soaking it up and having it knot in my solar plexus like a toxic waste-dump, I
can let it all roll off of me. I can still help that person if I truly want to, but I don’t have to alter my behaviour to make them feel better. Sometimes I can find that sweet separation
between them and me, and I can let them have whatever mood they are in. The problem
is, I am just learning how to do that.
That is the next act for me. I am learning to stop internalizing other
people’s feeling states, and to go about my life-enjoying people for who they
want to be, not what they are feeling in the moment. But until then, if you run into me in a crowded room and you
can see a faint twitching in the corner of my eye, just remind me to take a
deep breath!
