puppets

[kirkcudbright]

I'm in Amsterdam for a few days post-IETF. It's 3:30 in the freaking morning, which is no time to be starting a post, ah well.

To start with, Amsterdam is an amazingly beautiful city. They've managed to keep everything at a very human scale - very little that's above 4 stories, nicely compact for the number of people it has. They mostly get the balance of old and new right. I totally dig the bike culture (though someone tried to sell me an obviously stolen bike, and there are plenty of abandoned and/or vandalized bikes). (There will be pictures, oh yes.)

Parenthetically, Massachusetts wants to be Holland when it grows up, but seems a little unclear on how to go about doing that.

Anyway, the meat of this post is that I took a bunch of mushrooms (which are legal here), and went wandering around. Amsterdam is really the best place in the world to wander around while tripping - canals, crazy architecture, friendly people, and it all feels so safe.

OTOH, I'm a pretty introspective person to begin with, and I ended up navel-gazing for a while in Rembrandt Square (which is sadly not one of the more attractive places, but safe (but OMG Rembrandt himself, so NOT overrated)). And the big epiphany (or one of them, at any rate) was the analogy of the puppets. (If you read Skin Horse, I'm thinking of the therapy puppets.) Anyway, when I'm introspecting about relationships, I'm having some good insights, but I'm not actually talking to the people involved, I'm just talking to my own puppets of them, which may bear some resemblance to real people, but may also resemble a rabbit in a hat (I have this one at home) or a big ugly fish (ditto, and he has his own voice and shtick that was probably unconsciously modelled on Cookie Monster).

Anyway, the first-level epiphany is that I need to stop talking to the puppets, because that's basically talking to myself, and while it can amuse me for far too long, I need to be talking to the real people. Then it becomes a dialog.

The second-level epiphany was that everyone else has their own puppets of me, that bear some caricature resemblance to me, but aren't me. However (and this is the important part), if I don't make an effort to own myself, then all that people have to work with is their puppets of me. (One friend in particular (not on lj, unless he's stalking) has a pretty wild puppet show, from what I've seen.) But communication (especially really clear communication) takes time and energy, and I'm usually content to let other people play with their puppets, as long as they realize that's what they're doing.

There was more, enough to keep me brooding for a long time after I came down, but that's all that will fit on this postcard. The weather is lovely, wish you were here.

Comments

[johnromkey.livejournal.com]

That's very good insight. I think we spend a lot of time telling ourselves stories, and sometimes we forget that they're stories we told ourselves and not stories other people shared with us.

Do your puppets have puppets as well? Is it puppets all the way down?

Autistic folks or aspies might actually be lacking in puppets, or may have to put a lot of extra effort into making puppets.

Mirror neurons ftw!

[lillibet.livejournal.com]

That sounds like a lovely experience, introspection in odd places and all.

Jason's puppet of me is much more of a bitch than I am. He used to get into fights with her a lot, inside his head, until I asked that if he were going to fight with me he do it out here where I can participate. That helped a lot.

[foms.livejournal.com]

Thank you. Hugs.

[lyonesse.livejournal.com]

speaking as a friendly neighborhood aspie, we spend a lot of time reality-checking our puppets back with the people they nominally represent, since the technique is obviously useful but does not come particularly naturally.

i think we may be also esp likely to resent mistaken assumptions about ourselves from other people's puppets.

[weegoddess.livejournal.com]

Wandering solo around Amsterdam sounds unbelievably wonderful. I've only been there once (back when I was 20 and oh my was I young then) but I remember it well enough to wander there in my thoughts. It's very cool to think of you there.

I do understand what you mean by 'puppets' and likely we all have them in one way or another. It's even more likely to have them when the real people are too far away temporally or geographically. Ask me how I know. ;-/

FWIW, you showed up in a dream of mine a few nights ago. When I woke, it really felt like you and I had spent some time together and caught up on things. It was extremely nice to see you.

::my puppet hugs your puppet since distances don't matter to puppets::

[marktheorc.livejournal.com]

I think the key is to make a puppet that's grander than your are and aspire to become that puppet.

[whitebird.livejournal.com]

An interesting thing that I think a lot of people do, even in direct conversations, is that they're really talking to the other person's puppet, because they filter what they say (and for some people, hear) through their internal puppet interpretation.

[kirkcudbright.livejournal.com]

http://wondermark.com/644/