Everybody's changing...

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When you've been a member of a forum for a while, it can be quite strange to look back at your old posts. I'm not talking about here, but there's this other forum that I've been a member of for a lot longer. Back when I first joined that site, I was an incredibly cynical sixteen year old with a bleak outlook on life. There are particular sections which caught my attention, mainly how I talked about not feeling real along with a great deal of apathy.

My past self describes me as a blank slate, inconsequential, not to be trusted to make reasonable decisions. There's even a part where I remark that I "wish someone else would take control of my life", shortly followed by comparing myself to a model waiting for instructions during a photo shoot. I think what I was mainly trying to get at was that I lacked a sense of direction in my life, I had no motivational drive, and the uncertainty that caused me was quite significant.

At first, I mainly used the forum to seek advice and to learn new information. However, as time went on I began to gain a following. My posts were no longer for seeking advice, but also random musings about certain schools of thought. I was suddenly being called "inspirational" and was considered a well-known member. But then a controversial user decided to follow me (which was odd, because our world views are quite different and I didn't like them) and my followers began to drop a little. As I became more popular, I felt a certain amount of pressure. I was no longer posting threads for myself, but also for my audience. Yet I didn't want to give up my authenticity either.

I saw myself as having an established role on the website, I'd often make threads that went deep into a subject, and I'd provide advice to others (especially those who reached out to me). Although I'd started out as the one searching for advice, I slowly became the one that others requested advice from. Which was rather odd at times and sometimes I felt like replying "Please don't ask me, I haven't a clue what I'm doing either".

So when I did make the odd thread asking for advice, I tended to get responses such as "Thank you for sharing this with us. Found this post to be surprising. It goes to show that even the most straight-forward and collected of us can have off days. Really helps to put it all into perspective".

My old posts were soon buried by new threads as a few years passed, but occasionally I'd get a message from a new member who just found one of my old posts from researching into a topic. Usually it'd go something along the lines of "Hey! I'm new here and I just found your post on (insert subject here) and I can relate to a lot of it. Care to talk about it with me? Sorry, this might seem weird".

This sometimes lead to "Oh yeah, I posted that" or "Dammit why did I ever post that, what was I even thinking?". It was rather odd if someone brought up an old post that I made whilst in a completely different state of mind, I remember one time a user mentioned an old thread of mine and I wrote two pages detailing how my perspective changed after I wrote that and how some of it was complete bunk as a result.

One of the major downsides of forums is that your old posts typically remain, and sometimes that's the side of you that certain members are introduced to because that's the first posts they see, even though they may be rather different to the current you. I suppose it's similar to how when you think of the people you knew in secondary/high school you may imagine them as the age they were at that time, rather than the age they are now. Of course they've grown up just like you have, but if you don't have an updated version of them to compare that image with, then in a way that concept of them in your head never grows up. You always view them as if they are still that fifteen year old, even though logically they'd be in their 20's or so by now. Or perhaps I'm just stuck in the past.

A friend of mine (well, we were friends, but we drifted apart overtime) posted an imagine on social media that read "If you knew me in high school, then you don't actually know me at all", and I still think about that quote.

Change is usually a good thing, because it shows adaptation to reality. People who can't change are doomed. That's how I see it, anyway.

looking back on my own 17 year old pawprints, i see a lot of traits i still carry. and some i've lost and need to actually reclaim. i've become bitter over the years, i lost a lot of basic trust. i've become better in many things over the years, but i really like my 17 years old person much more, than my 29. she was brighter, she had integrity i lack. i had forgotten. then again, she also was very unaware and incapable of self-regulation. those traits of mature age are a benefit. i am attempting to reconfigure myself to take all the benefits from both states (as well as intemediates), and decrease the drawbacks. to let the girl i was make up for trauma i had sustained, to make the woman i am more whole. sometimes experience makes u stronger, sometimes it breaks u. i need a lot of duct tape here.

Muahaha Yes...


No matter. Stupid waste of a post or not, I won't regret it. It's one of the best ways to track one's progress.
Oh, and I reintroduced myself about twice maybe.


The child me sees herself more of a 'brute' who likes to go physical than 'brainy' -- at the same time, would rather ignore emotions over thoughts -- yet ever still this moody child.
Here, it's mostly just memories of how I take account of my own childhood.

The teenage me could damn relate well to the majority of posters here.
The wants, the should haves, the damn intolerances that anxiety brings, the denial, the hidden arrogance, the anger, the mistrust...

The me now is different.
The me now is just getting started -- and I may as well say the same thing all over for years. The me now figured, and figured that I haven't figured it out yet.


The me in the future.. Always uncertain. Always unknown. Could be better, could be worse -- and I'll do my best to be ready for it.

I've been in so many places.
Felt and dealt so many... Sensory seeking, sensory aversion, sensory intolerance, highs and lows of thresholds, sensitization, desensitization...
The coherence of EF, the turns, the catches, the holds... The loss and the gains both temporary and permanent...
Lessons learnt, lesons unlearnt... Lessons forgotten, lessons recalled...
Some did changed, some didn't changed, maybe some don't or can't.





And as a 23 year old? I still 'feel' I barely aged except for my body and anything else. Doesn't matter if I'm more mature, more serious, more experienced and exposed or wiser than people of my age -- I just feel younger.
The pace either feels stuck or very slow. If I look back now, I'm still barely starting at all. Took a leap at age 16, then jumped off somewhere at 20...
Yet I'm still as young as 8 in the inside, barely passing 12...

A part of me is rather melancholic about this.
That part of me longs of 'growing up', thought of things of what would have been for achievement's sake... That I 'should' move on like others had, that I 'should' do this, have that...

Still never learnt how to be a teenager -- like most people of my age did, and like most of the kids I knew 10 years back or so.

Gained Number Post Count (1).
Lose Time (n).

Lose more time here - Updates at least once a week.

I'd like to do this, but most of the forums I used as a teenager have since died.

well forum i've taken on is a husk. it hadnt been used for 10 years. still got my pawprints i could examine ^^ even easier that way, no cultural layer above xD

being adaptive is a good thing imo

haha adaptation is something most of us here are heavily handycapped at. me specifically. i got some skills, but it still takes a lot.

"The man who views the world at 50 the same as he did at 20 has wasted 30 years of his life."
Muhammad Ali

I haven't gone back to the old forums I've used but I remember the way I posted & what I posted about a lot. Also occasionally an old thread I posted in on this forum gets a new reply & I see my old post. I grew & improved alot over the years. I used to be very depressed & lonely. I gradually learned to work on some of my issues & I eventually got a girlfriend who I moved in with. The change of environment was really great for me. I don't like the person I used to me, I didn't like him then but I understand why he was like that & I'm soo glad I tried to work on myself & improve.