Knowing

Ignorance may be bliss but sometimes knowing can be fun.

Long long time ago....

For my 30th birthday, Tim had a surprise party for me.

For some unexplained reason, my friend revealed to me what was happening. She made it sound like it was an oops, but I got the feeling there was some kind of covert-aggression there.  But that's a whole other story.

Since I'm not really into surprises, it was not a huge loss for me. And I actually had FUN knowing that there was a surprise. I can't remember the details of that, but I do remember enjoying seeing my dad fumble around the whole thing. I think maybe he was the one who drove me to the party?

And with TV shows, it's fun trying to guess the who-did-it. But it's also a lot of fun when we know who did it, and we get to watch them try to hide it. Although it can also be extremely frustrating.

Maybe fun is the wrong word. Suspense might be better. Although suspense IS often fun when it's fictional. It's not fun when you're in suspense about whether your loved one is going to survive surgery or not or whether your house is going to be destroyed in a fire.

So anyway...the other thing I was thinking about in terms of losing ignorance is toxic behavior/psychological manipulation.

I don't want to say I enjoy getting toxic, manipulative texts and emails or that I enjoy encountering manipulation toxicity and manipulation in person.

For the most part, I hate it. I get angry, frustrated, disgusted, and hurt.  My tremor starts acting up....

I wish there'd be much less toxic behavior/psychological manipulation.

BUT....now that I know about these toxic things, there is a bit of fun in getting examples of it.

Shit. Fun really is the wrong word.

Maybe I should say...I find it fascinating?

Maybe it's like getting your arm bit off by a Great White Shark. You'd be screaming, terrified and in pain. But maybe you'd also sit there and think, Wow. I'm having a shark encounter.  I mean people pay a lot of money for those things. Or at least I assume they do.

In a previous post, I talked about how I've gotten into the habit of journaling and taking screenshots of texts and emails to prevent me from gaslighting myself.  Thinking about it, though, I think I also do it as a way of sort of collecting.

Some people collect photographs of birds. I collect screenshots of toxic behavior/manipulation.  

What I look forward to, though, is when the majority of people are knowledgeable about narcissism, toxic behavior, psychological manipulation, covert-aggression, etc. Well, first of all...I think it will reduce these behaviors, because some people use them only out of ignorance. They say and do things to gain the upper hand, preserve their self-esteem, or to preserve their reputation. But they don't realize it hurts other people, and once they do know...they will try to stop. Because they are mostly-good people who are simply misguided.

Then there are others who don't mind hurting people and would continue using these behaviors...BUT if the majority of people can recognize the various methods and tricks, then these methods and tricks will be much less effective. 

How would our world change if we knew for sure there was life after death, and it was easy for our dearly-departed to talk to us via the Internet?   

The Dead are Online  a novel by Dina Roberts