On the Phrases in "Shame & Redemption" - Part 7

When I started this project, I showed the block "Why are you *like* that?" to some people and asked them about their experiences with the phrase.

Some responses were to dismissively say “Oh, that happens to everyone.”

A second number responded accusatorily, saying, “That doesn’t just happen to you, you know.”

A third impatient response was “Just get over it already.”

Ironically, there is the same voice of the original shame in these first three responses. The second and third responses have additional bullying tones embedded in them. And as an aside, while it is alright for some people to say they do not want to dwell on it, it really isn’t their place to dictate to others that they *should* respond the same as them, however subtly.

Only one person I talked to said, “Oh, that happened to you too? I hated it when people said that to me, especially when I was a kid.” This response was by far the most compassionate, not only for themselves but for others.

The redemption phrase "The sole purpose in life is to exist as oneself" advocates for personal expression. We are not “put on this planet” to live as someone else dictates we should. We are not here to live as a convenient and easy personality for someone else. Rather, we exist solely as who we are.

Anyone who has any understanding of evolutionary biology knows that it takes a very wide array of behaviors for a species to survive any and all conditions that it might encounter. So, there will always be variation in adaptive human behaviors. Rather than shaming a person for being themselves, we ought to be celebrating our differences because they make for a livelier, more robust world.

So why am I *like* that? Because it is who I am. My only purpose is to live in this world as myself. I feel the same way about you.