If you were to ask my family they'd tell you that growing up I was a negative child ... that I had dark thoughts ... that I was pessimistic.
I think from their perspective that was absolute TRUTH. In their reality, what I was expressing brought those feelings out in them.
I had started to focus on and embrace #stoicism very early in order to deal with physical and emotional abuse (from them) and the rest of the world.
I talk about that here: https://counter.social/@thewebrecluse/109953679288754957
To me it was REALISM.
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My perspective was always on REALISM and the truth of my existence which, for them, was absolutely abhorrent.
I find this is true even online when it comes to people expressing the truth of their lives - especially BIPOC people.
Their reality is horrible for others to read about ... so much so that people will just flat out deny it's truth in fits of delusion and anger.
I talk about people living in different realities all the time because THEY DO. They aren't the same worlds AT ALL.
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Everyone's reality is specific to them ... it's DIFFERENT from others around them.
Think about people who live with #chronicillness or #disability or who are #neurodivergent or people who have #aphantasia or #faceblindness or whatever it may be.
Their worlds are, in many ways, impossible for you to comprehend living in and difficult for you to relate to.
The reality of living is different for everyone. You can only hope to scratch the surface of it ... but it doesn't make it less real.
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For many people and even my family ... my reality COULDN'T be real. My realism COULDN'T be truth.
That would mean that they would have to see something of themselves in it. That would mean they would have to face some kind of level of responsibility in what pain and misery I was expressing ... and there was no way in Hell that was happening.
This is true for those who deny the pain, hardships, and anger of others. They would have to recognize their contributions to it or their ignorance.
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Pessimism. Negativity. Anger. Fear.
These words are often used to DISMISS and DIMINISH the reality and truth that others are trying to express about their actual lives.
And yeah sometimes those feelings are dark and hard to read about and even harder to accept ... but it is someone's truth and someone's expression of their pain or their difficulties thriving.
It doesn't deserve to be dismissed or devalued simply because someone else is too cowardly to face it.
Listen. Believe. Assist.
The whole ... "life isn't like that FOR ME, therefore it can't possibly be like that FOR YOU" nonsense seems to be pervasive in places ... also along with the idea that there is something wrong with people who experience the world in x,y, or z way, because the world can't possibly be how they describe it ...
Oh it is.
@thewebrecluse I once told one of the step sisters about the abuse I went throught for decades from the Bitch aka," mother" and her response was, "Well, I never saw it."
ME: "just because YOU didn't see it, doesn't mean it didn't happen."