John asked why it feels so much scarier to navigate the world without my persona. I needed first to clarify that many people feel the way I feel. But that doesn't answer the question, although I think it does validate that I’m not just a freak. There are various elements in our culture that help create that phenomenon, but I also need to decide which I want to continue and which I want to unravel.
So there are several issues I think are rolled up in this issue. The first is that my persona isn’t fake. I sometimes talk as if my persona is a lie, but she is actually a mix of the aspects of my personality I like the best along with the parts that are sturdiest and the parts that are the most socially acceptable. (In much of the art I love the persona is treated as a lie, so perhaps that has encouraged me to express it that way.) But it isn't just a mask that is fake--she is truly part of who I am and a part I relish. I totally get high off the performing elements of my work and volunteering. I love my engagement in the world. And I love that I can navigate that world competently and confidently.
So, what exactly is in my inner, hidden gal as opposed to my persona? Well, she seems younger and naïve to me. She doesn’t have the sophistication. She has little sense of perspective. She can’t take a joke. While she never wanted to be teased, she was an irresistible target when she got a lot of public time (which she only did when I was much younger--pre-high school). Her earnestness drew taunts and jeers. She is more vulnerable in part because she has had less experience in the world, but also because the more vulnerable parts of myself ended up there as a protection mechanism and because that side of me encountered less of the nitty gritty parts of life, and thus became even softer and more protected.
I don’t think it would be good to parade her to the world, even as I think I must become better about integrating her with a few select people. But I think of what happened at a volunteer gig a couple of months ago when two younger kids tried to lead a revolt against me. Had my private gal been on display, I would have been hurt, and the kids would have smelled blood and this entire group of several months would have been mostly lost (as well as a reputation that would take a couple of years to live down.) But public gal handled it beautifully. “I don’t care if you like me. I care if you make the changes you want to make in your life. You’ll never see me after Christmas.” I can’t imagine private gal ever being able to say such a thing. If she is seen, she wants to be liked.
It’s funny that John sees me as having very poor boundaries, because re-reading our early e-mails, one of the early things that stands out is how guarded I was with him. How fiercely I fought for ground rules, at a cost that seemed tremendous to me at the time. But I suppose that is a result of boundaries based on people, rather than behaviors. (I mean, of course, there are behavior-based boundaries as well--for example Republican face-slapper [although John can clearly take me to that place in a way that makes me bouncier the next day, even it I still don't like the action itself], but aside from the more extremes--just little comments, it really depends on who as much as what.) Perhaps is I had a better defense mechanism based on behaviors I wouldn’t have to screen people so carefully.
Inner gal needs protection from the scrapes and bumps of life. Public persona can laugh stuff off. She knows how to take a joke. Private gal, not so much. And when I protect private gal more carefully, I'm able to be softer with the people I trust the most. When private gal gets too much air-time, I end up trying to prove myself more, I want people to like me more. I can't relax, let go, let fly.
That said, Private Gal wants to come out more. She’s aching for people to be at home with. I have one best friend and John that are the only people she’s really at home with. She’s never been at home with my other best friend. She got to know the ex in an erotic context, but the ex never cared about her enough to want to know her outside of that context. Steven sensed her immediately and bounded with her and adored her and worked to protect her. I’d never really had that experience before. My dad would have loved to know her, but he’s part of the reason that public gal protects her so fiercely. Dad never really had boundaries for her, never let her exist on her own terms. As soon as he saw a sign she was like “I’ve been waiting for you, come, come, come.” Not necessarily in a bad way in a hypothetical world, but in a very, very intrusive way that made private gal feel that she couldn’t be known without spilling her secrets or fiercely defending them. Growing up, she couldn't just be in the moment. If she existed she had to bare all.
It is weird that as a grown-up, private gal is still so vulnerable. I think without the sense of perspective, she takes any criticism, no matter how minute, as an absolute proof she’s unlovable. So it’s damn good that is only a few things I over-react that way on. And being sheltered from the world, she is more able to feel joy, more able to grieve, more in touch with her emotions. Really, private gal is mostly my emotional side that isn’t anger and public gal is my intellectual side, my values, and the emotion of anger. Anger is safe to represent, because it is always focused outward. The rest of the emotions are inward focused.
Alcohol seems to break down my barriers with John, even though that is not the case with most others. But with John, the perceived cost of disclosure seems to recede with booze. It’s like, when I’m tipsy, I assume he already knows all this stuff. Or if he doesn’t, he has some inkling that might not be right. So why not say it so it isn’t like this big, unspoken wall between us.
After last weekend, I SO wanted reassurance that I didn’t say or do anything wrong. I remember saying several things I’d never say sober, bordering on crassness and also I don’t remember everything with the clarity I usually have. But, I didn’t want to drive John crazy; more than that, however, I also felt in my bones that it was OK. Private gal knew that John appreciated her and public gal was mother-henning, saying “but, did he really like her? I don’t want to let her get hurt? Did he really?” And private gal said “he saw me and he accepts me.” There are times private gal is stronger than public gal realizes. Steven thought public gal was manipulative and controlling of private gal.
Steven commented (several times) that I had this weird split between being super-protective with my private side in real life, and then rather profligate with her with strangers (ala the blog). I can’t explain why the blog is an OK realm for her to play in, but it feels safe to me. John and Steven are the only two people who know who I am there, and I trust them both. And it is a safe place to claim and explore and own that side of myself. In fact, when I felt weird with the blog with not knowing if John was reading it or not, I really felt the lack of the outlet. Having a diary on my computer just isn’t the same. Private gal likes her moment in the sun.
In the future, I’d like to find a couple more places where private gal can come out. She needs non-erotic outlets (as well as a really fabulous erotic one). But I don’t want to be indiscriminate with her. I like her, and too much exposure would make her more sophisticated and less earnest. If anything, my public side needs a little more of the private gal's willingness to see the best in the world, happiness, joy.
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