twitchcraft galore

Choosing your words is an important part of expression and dialogue. I feel, however, that the emphasis should be on choosing words that most accurately and eloquently express the thoughts you are aiming to portray, as opposed to choosing words based on whether or not they will offend someone. That is not to say that I think everyone should go around saying whatever they want and offending people left and right. What I’m really interested in here is the crazy notion that people stop being so offended all the time!

I don’t think this idea is outrageous in the least. Think about it. If you stop letting yourself get so up in arms about a person’s choice of words, a few things happen:

1. Your vocabulary of acceptable language grows, and that can’t be a bad thing!
2. You more easily open yourself up to someone else’s point of view, leading to the possibility of great a conversation.
3. You stop focusing on the surface and are therefore more able to comprehend what is really being said.
4. The less you allow yourself to be offended, the lower your stress level, and the higher your overall contentedness.

While there are some situations which warrant a careful dialogue, such as in a professional setting, I believe that overall we could benefit from easing up on the damn sensitivity. Wouldn’t it be nice if we could just say what we mean without fear of someone pouting because you hurt their feelings in a very indirect way? Personally, I think it would lead to more clear-cut communication, and would lessen the chances for a misunderstanding. Besides, a lot of those politically correct terms are so convoluted that their meaning ends up being incorrect (if translated literally, such as using the term “African-American” to refer to any black person), their meaning is vague, it just sounds stupid, or it takes a lot longer to say than the original “offensive” term.

So how about this? Chill the fuck out. :P

Four months later I am back to where I started. No better. Only worse. Wasted countless time and money pursuing ideas that my doctor led me to believe were viable reasons for my symptoms. Little did I know that the whole time he was convinced that I simply have anxiety and plans to refer me to a psychiatrist (whom, of course, my insurance will not cover anyway).

Am I stressed? Yes.
Am I experiencing anxiety? Yes.
Am I slipping into a depression? Yes.
The difference here is that I know the cause of these three things. I know why I am experiencing stress, anxiety, and depression. They are not the CAUSE of my symptoms — they are the direct EFFECT of my physical state for the past four months and my lack of an answer.

So don’t sit there and tell me that anxiety is what is causing my fatigue, dizziness, blurred vision, electric head pains, and dystonia. If you were experiencing all of these things and nobody could help you figure out why — you’d be feeling some fucking anxiety too.

-poor memory
-high prices
-waiting in line
-having to pee
-sleeping
-stoplights
-walking across the building to the bathroom, only to discover that it’s being cleaned and you have to double-back to the bathroom on the OTHER side of the building – all while you’ve got a very full bladder
-standing around listening to people talk in a language you don’t understand, while you are patiently awaiting their instruction
-people deciding they need to take home your hard work and use it for the party they’ve having this weekend, instead of letting you use it to learn (which is why you were instructed to make it in the first place)
-cleaning up after other people
-having to repeat yourself because they weren’t listening to you the first time
-servers being down
-having nothing to eat