Adversity begets change, but it doesn't change who we are

So, I'm sure I've discussed how adversity changes you, close to ad nauseum. Nevertheless, the subject continues to deliver.

I'm still in the midst of re-watching the television series "Buffy the Vampire Slayer," soon with the series of "Angel" intermingled with it. I just started watching season three.

In the last episode of season two, Angel gets his soul back, just in time to be banished into oblivion. It's all more than Buffy can take, and she runs away from Sunnydale. Upon her return, in the first episode of season three, she's greeted with a lot of mixed emotions from her friends and family. They all felt pretty slighted by Buffy leaving without a word, and without any contact.

The thing Buffy forgot is that while she was going through her own personal hell, her friends and family were going through their own things too. It doesn't lessen what she was going through, but she was so overwhelmed by her inability to cope with her own problems, that she couldn't be the friend or daughter that her friends and family needed.

Things changed while she was on her own, and they changed while she put being there for people on hold.

Life's like that. I've been going through something very, very similar lately. I've spent a lot of time trying to find a way out of what has felt like a bottomless pit of despair. (Clearly, I am dedicated to my fantasy genre.) I have had difficulty being kind when I should have been. I have been quiet when I shouldn't have been. I have been absent when I should have been present. I've apologized for it where I can. Adversity changed me. It's not an excuse, and it's not something I'm proud of.

I know other people who have been trying to battle through their own personal wars, and finding themselves changing along the way as well. It's tough. When you find yourself losing the fight, you also seem to find yourself scrambling for any ray of sunshine you can find, even if it isn't real. That's a tough place to be too, because when you realize the little shred of hope you had was false, you get to feel like you failed all over again.

Two of my best friends are looking for jobs. One here at home, one across the pond. Both have been dealt difficult blows in their careers. Neither were happy before they felt those blows come crashing upon them. The hard part is facing the constant string of rejections that naturally goes hand in hand with job hunting. It's a little like dating--you don't marry everyone you go out with. You don't get every job for which you interview.

One of my friends had a really tough interview yesterday, but it was going well. One question dropped an emotional bomb on the entire scene, forcing my friend to relive the rejection and loss of the last job unraveling without warning. It makes you spiral. It's hard to focus on the likelihood that maybe the firing squad style interview session said a little more about the culture of this company than emotional implosion said about my friend. After all, if they really wanted to get to know my friend, asking the person who in a matter of three sentences pulled the rug out from under them probably wouldn't tell them anything about my friend at all.

The little shard of light--extinguished. My friend has gone on to fight another day, both with himself and with the hunt. But it doesn't feel any less bad.

When people see you at your worst, and understand why, you mistakenly assume that they will extend understanding and kindness. But life goes on whether you're a part of it or not. And for other people, what they are going through outweighs what you are going through. It's only natural. But it doesn't make you stop wishing for understanding and forgiveness. It doesn't make you stop looking at yourself cross-eyed.

But just because you bear your own responsibility for some of the wounds you have sustained, it doesn't mean that you should accept that people want to kick you when you're down. And sometimes the kicking just makes you angry. You want to look at people and just say: "I get it. You got what you want. Stop sabotaging any tiny bit of happiness I am trying to find for myself." But you can't. You can't say anything, because adversity changed you, and you were in the wrong. It's almost as if you no longer have a right to ask to be treated decently.

Sometimes we can't talk to anyone about how we feel. Sometimes everyone close to us is going through something and they can't bear one more bit of darkness. Sometimes they can't even bear a tiny sliver of your light. It leaves you in a hazy, grey static world that is probably moving forward, but you can't feel it.

It doesn't matter how much you want to defend yourself, or the things in your life that have meaning. Nothing feels worse than people having the power to chip away at your dreams, even if they do it from a distance. Having tiny pieces of your hopes belittled or torn at sucks. It just does.

Adversity changes us, but it doesn't change our core.

When Buffy came back to Sunnydale, her friends felt so awkward around her that when her mother invited them for a quiet dinner, they threw an impromptu party so they wouldn't have to really deal with her. Buffy found herself surrounded by people who didn't really know or care about her. She felt isolated and alone, and it made her want to run away, all over again.

Sometimes you gotta die to live.

Luckily, zombies attacked, and being the slayer that she is, she managed to rally her friends to defeat them. No matter how much adversity had changed her, and no matter how much she had hurt the people she loved with her absence and melancholy, she was still the same Buffy.

Sometimes, we just need to to have a brush with death to come back to life.

Changing--The Airborne Toxic Event

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