I don't want to be a dark person anymore. Why would you just settle for "dealing" with it? I fricken hate it. I want to get rid of it; not deal with it.
I hate it too, but it is also part of me. I cannot cut it out of me, so I need to deal with it, even try to channel it to something more positive.
If you start partner dancing, one thing you will invariably have a problem with in the beginning is the connection and how to move your partner without trying to muscle her. I never went through that myself, because about 25 years prior to my first dance lesson I had practiced Aikido, the Art of Harmonizing Ki (life energy, mind, The Force). Really freaky stuff if you get into the right school that emphasizes Ki training. Ki flows through us all, so we control our own ki through four principles: 1) stay relaxed (not the same as being limp), 2) remain centered on your one-point (your center of gravity which is about where your belt buckle is), 3) keep weight on the under-side, and 4) extend your mind. If you have one, you have them all, but when you lose one you lose them all; the secret only advanced black belts learn is not in keeping the Four Principles at all times, but rather in regaining them when you lose them -- our sensei taught us that from an experience in his own advanced training. When you do start dancing, we can discuss how Aikido had taught me almost everything I ever needed to know about dance connection.
The basic "combat" principle in Aikido is the idea that the attacker (AKA "uke") in the act of attacking is projecting his ki towards the defender (AKA "nage"). If the nage tries to block or fight against the uke's attack, then the outcome is very likely to go to the physically stronger of the two. Therefore, the nage should "join forces" with the uke, in that he "blends his ki with the ki of the uke"
and then redirects that ki keeping your own center while throwing the uke off of his center, such that in Aikido you never throw the attacker, but rather you "lead him into falling". In more Western terms, the defender does not seek to clash with the motion/momentum of the attacker, but rather he blends his motion with the attacker's such that the defender remains in control and in balance while the attacker is off-balance, such that the consequent motion sends the attacker flying. Though I have participated in exercises where I was able to "throw" the attacker without ever even touching him and had the same thing done to me; in Aikido we called that "leading the mind."
We went through several exercises. Rather than describe the more interesting ones, there is a simple one where the uke has both his hands clasped firmly on your wrist. Now, the best situation for the techniques is when there is already motion, but this starts from a stand-still, which makes it harder. If you push towards the uke or pull away from him, then that he can use his strength against you and it's muscle against muscle. But if you move at right angles between you, the uke is weaker. Now for the principle of extending your mind. If you try to move your wrist, then your mind stops at your wrist and you usually cannot move it. But if you extend your mind beyond your wrist out through your finger tip, then you are stronger; move your finger tip instead of your wrist and he cannot stop you -- a circular motion to start the motion usually helps.
The point I was trying to make there is that instead of confronting a strong force, such as your dark nature, you could accomplish more by blending with it and redirecting it. A counselor should be able to help you in that endeavor.
Picking a counselor. "America's most prominent atheist", Dan Barker, was raised a fundamentalist Christian and served several years as a fundamentalist minister. Back in the mid/late-1980's, I first heard of him when a local atheist group played his presentation to them on radio (simmer now, 15 minutes per week compared to how many hours of fundamentalist Christian broadcasting per week?). In that he described how he grew up listening to his mother singing in tongues while doing the housework. The point he was making there was what he described as "when your theology becomes your psychology." Basically, he was making an argument that fundamentalist Christians (and fundamentalists of other faiths, I would guess) psychologically think differently than non-fundamentalists do. What I have experienced and witnessed tends to support that view. During my divorce, the second most horrendous experience of my miserable life, a friend talked me into going through her mega-church's DivorceCare program. Because I had eyes to see and ears to hear (refer to Mark regarding the parables teaching about the
mysteries of heaven, then read up on the mystery religions), I could see how that appealed to believers, but to a non-believer it was almost all pure rubbish. Far worse than rubbish because the recurring message was "you cannot possibly recover on our own but rather you need Jesus' help", which tells me, a non-Christian, that there is no possible way I could ever recover. Rather counter-productive, wouldn't you agree? Oh, it did have some kernels of wisdom in it, but those kernels were buried until mountains of sectarian religious nonsense -- nonsense to non-believers at least.
A second indication that Dan Barker was on the right track is the simple verifiable fact that there are basically two different types of counselors: regular counselors and Christian counselors. The very fact that there is a definite and separate market of "Christian counselors" serving a clientale that normal counselors are deemed unable to serve. What other reason could there be for so many Christian counselors unless there were an actual psychological difference between fundamentalists and normals?
A third indication was the long-running series of presentations at a second local mega-church (oh, but Orange County is so "blessed" by these mega-churches -- my friend was so incredibly surprised and pleased when she learned that I'm not only not a Republican (far too many Republicans here inside this Blue State) but also not a fundamentalist Christian like far too many other guys here, and women too judging from the listings in match.com), that were presented by two Christian counselors for singles. Singles are a big market here; Saddleback Church alone has a singles ministry serving about 15,000 singles. Oh, those two Christian counselors used several of the same principles as did normal counselors, but then they'd always twist it back around to a Christian perspective -- not surprising, since that was the audience that they were playing to. You need to set boundaries and do these things to make your life better. Why?
Because that's what Jesus wants. OK, I'm not a Christian, so why should I make my life better? You're telling me that there's no fracking reason. You need to surround yourself with positive people who will influence you and lead you in the right direction. In what direction?
To God. OK, I'm an atheist, so what does what you're saying have to do with me?
You see now, Christians and non-Christians (or at least non-Fundamentalist/non-Evangelical/non-Conservative Christian types) are being treated as having different psychologies.
What kind of counselor should you seek? Christian or normal? A normal counselor may not be able to deal with your religious concerns. But if your problem is precisely because of your theology, would a Christian counselor be the right pick for you? Would he be motivated to lead you back to "the light" (though I suspect that you are yourself suspecting that there is more darkness in your theology)? But then instead he might be able to help you harmonize your way through your problems.
In short, I am dark, you are dark. The blind leading the blind. I am not qualified to help you. You have to find your own way, but you can find help from others. Your dark is part of your; you would not be complete without it. Learn to deal with it. Learn to use it, to redirect it. To
complement it with light. To grow by developing the other, non-dark parts of yourself.
Develop your social skills. I had one of the worst times in high school which almost thoroughly alienated me. But in college I formed friendships and acquaintances. I would hang out with fellow students and chat with them. I was usually more well-read than they were, having been a loner before, and I was told by one friend that what I said was often too deep for most. But you are now in the ideal place to start to develop your social skills. Hang out, chat, try to keep it light for the most part, but do argue your point when you do have a point and can support it.
Also, judging from your interactions here, learn that disagreement with your ideas is not equivalent to hating you. In your face-to-face discussions, don't take any of it personally. Even if it was meant to be personal, don't take it personally. Keep it all as academic as possible. In the process, learn to deal with others, both when they're behaving properly and when they're behaving improperly.
This is perhaps out-of-line, but it might help. There is a process called "socialization." No (as my friend's right-wing brother from Arizona mistakenly took it), it has nothing whatsoever to do with socialism. Rather, it is what every member of society needs to learn, how to learn to deal with everybody else in society. Part of the concern of home-schooling is that part of the school experience needs to be socialization, learning to get along with others. My friend once took a look at the Red-and-Blue map of the USA and noticed that the blue (Democratic) regions were on the coasts and centered around large population centers where you absolutely have to learn to get along with others whereas the red (Republican) regions were the sparsely-populated "fly-over" parts of the country where hardly anybody lives or has to learn how to get along with others. That is her own personal conceit, but she may nonetheless have a point.
We need to learn to socialize. I think you are very strongly expressing that need now. Socializing is where our strength lies as a species. Alone, we are nothing, but together we can reshape the face of the earth and beyond. And we are driven to socialize, which is why we are gregarious (wanting and driven to form into groups and find enjoyment in being in a group, in the company of others). Learn how to socialize, how to function within a group. You've described people who are trying to include you socially. People do care for you. Work with them, learn from them. They are trying to help you, so help them to help you.
You created this threat with the intent of finding an intimate female relationship. OK, that's one goal.
What I have found is that I form friendships with women more easily than with men; my father told me that it was the same for him. In my 61 years, I only had one intimate female relationship for about 30 years, but that ended in disaster; before that, there was another of some months, but in the end it didn't work out. Since the divorce, I've had three close female relationships, none of which were intimate. My point is that you are looking for an intimate female relationship, but most of the female relationships you will have will not be intimate. From your other message, you do have a female relationship and from my experience it is likely to not be intimate -- ruddy poor logic there, I'll grant you!
A lot has been made of the difference between men and women, perhaps much more than necessary, perhaps not enough. For example, my own life experiences have led me to be extremely distrustful of women's motives, even though I do like women. What do women want? What do they think? How are we men supposed to ever figure them out? There are the romantic comedies (which I enjoy but my friend hates), but who's writing them? There was even one, "Friends with Benefits", in which the female lead complains about romantic comedies being responsible for the unrealistic expectations people have. Steve Moffat's UK series,
Coupling (available on NetFlix streaming), made a point of juxtapositioning male and female perspectives on the same issues/events. But ultimately, your best source of perspective is from your friends, especially your female friends.
When we graduated with our Computer Science degrees (but I still had two years of active duty before me), a friend (male, this time) sent out nearly 80 resums and only got one offer, but that is all it takes. Another friend had more experience with match.com and she said that it took about 300 hits to come up with one potential date. Bottom line: you only need one intimate relationship, but that never keeps you from having large numbers of other non-intimate relationships with either gender. Until that one intimate relationship comes along, your other female relationships can help you to figure out your various female contacts. You know, there's a thing called "flirting". I still haven't figured it out. At first, while I was still married, some of the women in class were doing things that I didn't understand. Now, when you're married, you learn to be blind to flirting, so when something happened in class that I wasn't sure of, I simply wrote it off as nothing. But now that I'm divorced, I'm still doing that. There's a funny episode of
Coupling where one of the guys is keeping his phone line open while he's with a woman from work who likes him (but he has a girlfriend) so the women are there to translate what the woman is saying. The bottom line is that you will need to become more socially aware and conversant. Do make the fullest use of your female friends.
Back to dark for a moment. If you watch
Doctor Who, review the 10th Doctor episode,
Blink (if you have a friend with a NetFlix account, have him call it up). Early on in that episode:
Kathy Nightingale: "What's so good about sad?"
Sally Sparrow: "It's happy for deep people."
Just a parting thought.
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