At the Christmas Lunch

A personal story about perfectionism in writing, emotional boundaries, and what a Christmas lunch revealed about self-trust and growth.

On Perfectionism

This piece of writing taught me so much.

Not about the subject matter, but about me. And the perfectionism.

Notice how I didn’t say ‘my’ perfectionism?
I had to resist that urge. Never refer to something as ‘my’ if it’s unwanted.
By doing so, you’re telling your mind that it’s yours. And, it’s not.
Like everything, it’s just temporarily passing through your experience.

So I wrote the piece right after I got home from the Christmas lunch.

It felt good to get it out. I left it there, on my screen, and came back to read it a little later. That’s when I thought: maybe I could make this into a post?

I don’t follow a schedule for writing posts, I mostly just write Notes. But every so often, one ends up being more like a post. As in, it has a ‘story’ to it.

But when I re-read it the next day, it seemed more like a rant, not a story.

So I started tweaking.

Explaining, within the story, why I felt the way I did.

Defending myself by adding something about how it’s not as if I never do this thing (the raging, which you can read about below).

Proving that I’m empathic to the rager’s issue.

The things I added were purely explanatory, because I couldn’t stop imagining how someone would see me when they read this.

I imagined they’d think:

Wow, you’re kinda judgy, aren’t you?

I mean, have you never done this yourself?

And yet, the point of the story was not about the rager.

At all.

It was about me.

It was to celebrate my self-growth. I was proud that I hadn’t dipped into the rage.

If you read it you’ll see what I’m talking about. But, ultimately, in the re-writing of it, I’d lost my original spark for the story.

It felt flat and uninteresting.

So… I’m posting the original draft now, quickly, before I’m tempted to revise it again. (Thankfully the Substack app keeps previous versions!)

The Christmas Lunch

So at lunch today, a big Christmas celebration, I was sitting beside someone who was initially just talking about something.

Then complaining about it.

Then vehemently raging against it.

While it was not directed at me, or indeed at anyone in the immediate vicinity, their vehemence commanded the attention of anyone nearby.

Others at the table seemed fascinated, almost feeding off it. Their rapt attention apparently encouraging the speaker.

I tried to look away, to ignore it (impossible… especially when I was sitting beside this person and a bit of spittle landed on my arm as their words were projectiled out of their mouth).

This isn’t me… but it’s kind of what I was trying to do at the lunch

I intentionally didn’t engage, didn’t look at their face, attempted to stay within myself.

And that seemed to enrage them, as if they had to up the force of their energy output to get my attention. As if they were insisting that I mirror them.

Of course, I wasn’t dismissing their cause for concern. The issue itself was valid and upsetting.

It was the demand for others to participate in the emotional spiral of it that was difficult to be around. It felt as if they wanted their level of anger reflected back to confirm its validity.

Photo by Andrea Cassani on Unsplash

In that moment, it almost felt like I was being attacked. As if they were screaming for my attention.

Finally, I gave in and feigned some interest, gave some focus, some attention to their face, their eyes, and waited for the storm to pass.

When I went home, I was exhausted. Could barely move for a couple of hours, so I lay down.

I’m proud of myself for not abandoning me.

Years ago I would have jumped in right away, matched their energy, played along, been the pleasant and supportive listener.

This time I didn’t, and that felt good.

Thank you for reading. 🫶