Accuracy

Or, perhaps, the role of faith in life. Not faith in Something Higher Than Oneself, but rather faith in one's self. The idea runs something like this: I "know" that X is true, and (double) checking that X actually is true is boring/painful/etc., so I don't check. (Here X should be taken to be a statement about another person's behavior.) The line here between a healthy self-esteem and arrogance, closed-mindedness, condescension, and all the rest is not clear to me. In fact it's not clear that there even is a line; it could all be arrogance, closed-mindedness, and condescension.

This is a bit of a shame, as I do this all the time. Past performance may not be indicative of future results, but I'm such a creature of routine that I automatically assume the same of everyone else. And just because I've been right 347 of the past 349 times doesn't mean that I'll be right this time.

For example, this can make student interaction troubling and time-consuming, as students often ask questions with "false" suppositions. Technically, when a student with a 35 average asks if they can pass the class if they get an A on everything that's left in the term, the answer is "Yes" (depending on your grading scheme, of course). However, the compulsion is strong to answer "Yes, but if you had the ability or drive to get an A in the rest of the class, you wouldn't have a 35 now." I'm usually not that blunt, but I do make the point that you will need an A on everything else, no margin of error, and do you really know what it takes to get an A on a quiz, let alone the final? (Side story: in my current class, I have 175 homework questions assigned throughout, all officially due at the end of the term. I have several students who don't understand why I'm getting on their case about their poor homework record; they have a whole weekend left to do it all. There's only one who didn't even try to start until this weekend; the rest had at least done a set of 15 or so.) And I know if I asked four different higher-ups the appropriate tone to take, I'd get seven different answers. (Five different ones in person, with a couple of carefully-worded e-mails.)

And of course, the same is true in personal relationships as well. (The post is tagged "whiny narcissism" for a reason, people.) I remember arguing with my therapist back in college about whether it was a good idea to cruise bars looking for women. My points back then (and they're my points now too, 'cause I'm that stubborn) were (1) bars are both boring and sickening (that much cigarette smoke gives me large headaches) and (2) "she likes bars and I don't" is not the greatest basis for a relationship that I've seen. Her point was (3) you've got to do something, dammit. The problem is that I "know" what the results are going to be (with a record like mine, who wouldn't?), and I don't like headaches, so why even go out when you can do interesting Google searches?

I need a crisis of faith.

Pain

It's bad form to talk about yourself, but I don't have any readers anyway, so why not?

I've always had a weird relationship with pain. I am extraordinarily non-pain-tolerant; and if I have to "cause" the pain myself I become positively pain-avoidant. I put up with allergy shots for seven years or so, but I could have never given them to myself. If I ever become diabetic, I might as well just shoot myself.

I've always thought that my inability to work the social/dating scene (or, for that matter, to even find it) was mostly laziness, with some fear-of-crowds thrown in. And while I am still an amazingly lazy person, and I don't like crowds, I am starting to think that the pain issue might be the biggest block. High school was what it was -- no one expected any better and that's all right then. But the women I went to college with were experts; they could make borrowing a pen a painful experience. (Compare "Have you ever had Professor X before? Is he any good?" with "Have you ever had Professor X before? My boyfriend's on the football team. Is Professor X any good?" For that matter, compare "You can give me a call; if I'm not in, leave a message" with "Give me a call. No one will be there to answer it, because both I and my roommate really live on the other side of campus in our boyfriends' rooms, but we check our messages every day or two" in a situation where I was being asked a favor. And I did it anyway.)

But I find myself avoiding any situation where someone could make any sort of personal comment at all. Work--no problem--even out for drinks afterward. But talking to someone who doesn't have to remember that they have to see me in the office every day? I'm avoiding it (I can't even bring myself to look things up on the internet, and you know that's bad), and I can't see how it's going to happen (even when someone has tried to shame me into leaving the apartment, it hasn't happened). But in the long run that's okay, because I am Broken.

(This has been part one of many in the series "Whiny Narcissism".)