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Posted by james on May 5, 2001

It occured to me the other night how I react to myself in social situations. There's times when you're hanging out with you friends, and you have a lot of fun. Everyone's talking, contributing, there's usually a lot of joking around and making fun. I was telling someone just a bit ago, during a serene moment of the day, how I used to always take a moment out of any hectic situation to gain perspective. I'd be having fun with my friends, then suddenly get the urge to walk around the building by myself just to be quiet for a moment. It gives you perspective you can't see while you're in the situation. You start to drop preconceived notions about what's going on around you, and think about questions that until then have been drowned out by the noise and activity... why are you here? Why is the thing you're doing fun? What would this look like to someone else? After a little bit I just rejoin and continue whatever I was doing... the questions are not supposed to directly affect the things I'm doing, they're just supposed to give me the moment to see whatever it is I'm doing from another perspective.

I was thinking about how little I've done that lately. I do things with friends, and never take the time to appreciate what's really going on. My mind is too engrossed in whatever's happening, whether it's on the conversation in front of me or the reactions people have to each other. I simply float along as if the things going on around me were some kind of current, and I allow myself to be swept along with it. It's not a bad thing... I guess I just miss the perspective.

There's another thing that seems to happen when I remove myself. I'm usually an underspoken person, and I enjoy being that way. When I'm having fun with my friends sometimes I'm more outspoken than I would usually be. And when I remove myself for a moment, it's as if I can hear the echos of the things I've said still ringing in my ear. If I haven't been too outspoken, I don't even notice it. But if I have, I get the feeling as if I've just yelled something out in a sudden lull in the conversation, and my words carry across the room. They echo in my ears, making me think back about what I've said and how I said it. It makes me think about my words to see if they were too outspoken, if I lost track of how I'm acting and allowed words and actions to happen without forethought. It's not a horrible thing to be lost in the moment... but somehow, it's just not me.