picture in my mind

Once, during a book club discussion, we had talked about how much we were shaped by our parents -- both genes-wise and through parenting -- and how to this very day, the very actions we perform and the people we are, are reflections of the emotions that were wrought while we were in our early childhood (and perhaps later as well) in their presence or lack thereof. And it is not uncommon, when you talk to your friends, to find how much of their life philosophies can be traced back to how much they wish or don't wish to turn out like their parents.

I hope that I have learnt to no longer resent or blame my parents as teenagers are wont to do -- but it does not negate the fact that I realise there are some things in my life that are a result of how I have interacted with my parents. It makes me feel horror, more than anything else, that one really cannot escape one's ancestry and upbringing.

I just realised today that my mother has unintentionally taught me really well not to care for others' opinion of me. Because she was the quintessential example of someone who did care. And I suffered under her scrutiny and approval for the longest time in my childhood, until one day, it came to me that maybe what she thought might not matter; that her benchmark and her measure of me did not have to be my world; and that maybe her word was not necessarily law. And I was slowly and surely liberated from the prison of her expectations. I have realised that from then on, subconsciously I had learnt to very finely and adeptly sieve out people whose opinions do not matter to me, and they are effectively out of my picture. I believe I was generally impervious to bullying and gossip growing up (on top of the fact that I was so blur to begin with, and pretty much did not care what everyone else was doing or talking about). But I think this is what scares me now.

I have found that I am so good at disregarding certain people because I actually think so little of how they think; I judge them quickly and subconsciously whether they fall into the particular category -- to be accorded respect as any human being, but whose opinions I feel hold little weight and impact on my life. I really am not sure if this is a positive skill, but right now, because it includes my mother in one fell swoop -- I wonder if in essence it makes me a terrible, terrible, dismissive person.

I have discussed this with E before -- when we had concluded that she was frequently so riled and bothered by other people because she expected so much more from all of them -- but I on the other hand appear so tolerant and accepting only because I have already pre-judged them: people are generally terrible, rude, self-centered, so don't let's get bothered if they're mean to you. And I appear so awesome and tolerant on the surface, right? I have so little faith and expectation of people. And that's what gets me by in life unbothered.

In my true style, all of this reminds me of a fictional character: the Mord-Sith Cara from Terry Goodkind's Legend of the Seeker.