Introspection and Listing My Defenses; Part One

Week 23 was such a gold mine of info I’m posting most of it in three parts. Enjoy this excerpt from Ronin’s Journey

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An interesting observation was made to me one day; it was that I am acting out a part, very well in fact. A combination of the different parts I played growing up, usually superheroes and western characters as I wrote about previously. The theory was playing the part buried my real personality when I was growing up. So I tested it, looking deeper I questioned my family. I was told that dad was my hero, personality wise I was quiet, read, and drew with a love for superheroes and Garfield the Cat. Mom said I was not particularly cuddly to begin with, unless I was hurt, then I wanted her. I had always had a stubborn streak and rarely cried since ‘only babies cry’.

In retrospect, I had not changed much at all, leaving me to direct my attention elsewhere. Looking deeper into Freudian Defense Mechanisms I learned quite a bit, intellectualization being the primary one covered earlier. To refresh our memories, it is where you distance yourself from those sucky feelings by focusing on the intellectual parts. Listed as a neurotic defense along with isolation and withdrawal. That just feeds my introspective nature even more, however there were other unconscious defense mechanisms coming into play.

Listed as healthier, mature mechanisms I found humility, mindfulness, humor, and identification on the lower end with higher doses of altruism, introjection, and emotional self-regulation. Looking deeper at the minor ones I will start with humility, after a hell of a wakeup call you get a more honest look at yourself and it can be humbling. Quite honestly, I was a self-important ass; my friends must have the patience of saints. Mindfulness, being aware of the moment, in my case I am studying myself in action with my surroundings.

Curiously, humor was the most interesting one, and I wonder if it pertains mostly to so-called ‘dark humor’. I bought a book on a baby’s body language by Desmond Morris so I could understand my infant goddaughter better and found a theory on how laughter develops in it. Morris’s wrote that when you do something that startles the child they start to scream until something in their head realizes it’s okay. This is processed fast enough the scream’s exhalation is cut short into choppy laughter. It is a joyous relief that what scared them is not happening anymore, so I am wondering if nervous laughter and dark humor is the pressure relief valve. You ever been in a wreck and laughed nervously or joked afterwards? I have, I was very happy I was safe.

If you’ve ever heard someone who’s seen or been in a tragedy (paramedics, cops, etc.) make a joke about it or an aspect of it, it’s okay. It’s a way the brain unconsciously processes this instead of snapping or burying it to explode later. It shows up frequently in my grief journal, like the entry noting people hoping for a good New Year. My standard for a good year is much different, like having no one dead or in jail, except it was crasser.