So after a month plus in Noosa I’m back in Brisbane. I really enjoyed Noosa but it was time to move on and see something new. It’s beautiful there but it’s a bit too small for me. You start seeing the same people over and over. It was getting to be a bit redundant.
My plan now is to move north to Cairns. Making a few stops along the way of course. My original plan was to rent a car for a few weeks and make the drive up. That way I can do a bit of camping as well. But my friend Sal is leaving in a few weeks and she will be selling her car. It’s a good car and depending on price I might take it off her hands. We will see.
I’ve lost a few essential items in the last few months so coming back to Brisbane allowed me to stock up on a few things. I needed a new water bottle and some new sneakers. Picked up a ukulele as well. But I sliced my finger yesterday so might be a few weeks until I can play again unfortunately.
On another note, I’ve been having some odd conversations and interactions over the last few weeks. For some reason, some of the people that I’ve been meeting have been eager to give me unsolicited opinions on my character. This really hasn’t happened to me in the past and it’s a bit odd to be judged in this way by people that don’t even know me as a person.
I’ve been told that I’m overly sarcastic and this can make people feel odd or offended. This is something that I agree with. I need to be more careful about what I say to certain people. Especially people that don’t have English as a first language. At times I try to make a joke but they don’t understand that I am being sarcastic and they take offense to it. It’s understandable. If someone was being sarcastic to me in Spanish it would be difficult for me to recognize.
I do think that it’s a product of being from New York. All my friends and I are sarcastic with each other and it’s so usual for us that we don’t think twice about it. We understand when we are being sarcastic and not take it seriously. But that’s not something that most people I meet on my travels understand.
Some other remarks have bothered me a bit if I’m being totally honest. I’ve been told that I am arrogant and I make people feel unimportant. I’ve been told that I come off as judgmental. I’ve been told that I am “abusively smooth”. Whatever that means. And all of this in the last two weeks or less.
I like to think I’m a pretty self-aware person. Am I perfectly aware? Do I sometimes come across or act in ways that don’t align with what I want to portray? Absolutely. Everyone does. But to be told I come across as arrogant and judgmental is a bit surprising. Hearing that kind of shook me a bit if I’m being honest. Because it totally contradicts the way I want to treat other people.
It really made me think. Is this what I’m actually putting off? Or are the people that decided to offer this opinion confused or mis-perceiving certain situations?
And I came to the conclusion that these assessments are not valid and I reject them. First off, I trust my awareness enough to understand that this is not my intention and in most situations, I express myself well enough to get across my actual intentions. Can I sometimes come across as arrogant or judgmental? I am sure. But most of the time this isn’t the way I act towards others.
Secondly, having had known these people for a few weeks each and also observing them and understanding how they act towards me and others I can say that they are not as self-aware as they would like to believe themselves. I am not going to take their words as the truth. They are not able to understand how they are coming across to others so how can they understand my intentions and how others perceive me?
I love myself. I definitely understand that I have things to improve upon. But I am trying my best to be the best possible version of myself. I want to make people laugh. I want to make people feel comfortable around me. And I can’t buy into the fact that I make people feel judged or disregarded a majority of the time.
I trust myself and my understanding of who I am. Maybe a few years ago I would have changed myself and the way I acted based on what others said about me. But now I understand that what others say isn’t the truth all the time. I have the space to understand and make a choice for myself. It just goes to show how much I have grown as a person in the last few years.