Losing My Patience With Those Still Catching Up.

This is a non-baby post. 

OK, so some of you know that I've had a bunch of trouble in my life.  Not a HUGE amount, but enough where my growing up and maturing into an adult was thrown off and I had to over-compensate and grow up a little late and work through some issues and be in lots of therapy. 

So my general thought about myself for most of my life was that I was "crazy" and broken and wasn't as good as other adults.  But over the last few years I've changed a lot and now it's switching to  me generally feeling like I'm mature and functioning well and acting consciously and making good decisions.  Not that it's easy, but over all, I am fitting in with society and accepting myself as being unique and intelligent without being "crazy." 

In fact I think some of my issues in life were advantageous because I really learned a lot about how emotions work and how to get what you want out of life without being in control of anyone else.  I really feel like my coping mechanism for the little bumps in the road are very well polished and working well.  Major stressors still will throw me off the path, the wedding was a big one, I had a few days where I felt completely insane, but it was just a few days, most days were just mild insanity. 

I also think, for the most part, I don't take my anger out on others and if I do, I recognize it right away.  I say kind things and try to work smoothly with others, even if I do not get along with them or I think they are dumb.  If I snap at anyone I usually apologize and explain why I snapped and how it wasn't really about them.

So, awesome for Andrea, right? 

Not so fast.  People who are not emotionally mature bug the crap out of me.  I can see their issues really well, I can put a label on their problems sometimes.  I can also see what might help them.  How they could change their thinking or behavior that would help them and also make dealing with them easier.  It's because I've been there before or witnessed people close to me deal with these things for years.  But I'm NOT in charge of them and have no control and really can't to squat about it.  And this part is really hard for me. 

So the choice becomes accepting a person for who they are or avoiding them to cause myself less distress.  I do a little of both in my life.  There are some people I don't have much contact with at all because they are simply too nuts for me to ever want to be around.  I can deal with people who have issues, but I need to be able to see that they are dealing with their issues and growing and changing as a person, this is a rare occurrence, but is a trait in most of my closest friends. 

I'm friends with people who have grand ideas and change their minds a lot and wonder all over the place because we are lost people trying to figure it all out, we are changing career paths and seeing therapists and taking up new hobbies and forgetting them a week later, because we are trying to get a hold of our life, we are trying to grow and change and become high-functioning adults.  We can be selfish and flaky, but all for good reasons.  Rarely do we stay in dead-end jobs or relationships without really discussing them and looking at our other options, we are always plotting and thinking, our significant others might not know, but sometimes we think about ditching them.  Might sound mean, but we re-evaluate things a lot, even unnecessarily sometimes.  At least that's my impression of me and my friends, maybe they have other thoughts. 

So when I see someone who clearly has issues, who doesn't seem aware of their issues and/or doesn't seem to want to resolve their issues, or is in total denial about their life, I really have no more patience for these people.  Luckily I haven't run into many of these people holding red flags, maybe a dozen or so that really bothered me over my adulthood. 

And if I've learned anything in my lifetime, it's that you can't change others.  Reality is depressing.  So I guess this was a rant on how I can't fix others' crazies and it bothers me sometimes. 

And if you are one of those who has issues, please, make the world a better place and help yourself.