“Maybe everyone can live beyond what they’re capable of.” — Markus Zusak
Last night I allowed my thoughts to wander to all the horrible places I had been stopping them from going. I had a long cry. Sobbing really. Uncontrollable it seemed. But it wasn’t. It stopped. It didn’t feel particularly good to have done it. Well, maybe a little. I like a good cry normally. At a movie or reading a book, not real life. I also like happy tears. Anytime either of my sons has a school performance of any sort I cry.
It was with significant trepidation that I called Gina’s husband today. I got his voice mail. I felt like an utter moron saying that I was calling to see how things were going. I finally just said I was calling to check in.
I was not prepared for what he told me when he called back.
She seems to be doing better. A lot better. No, the doctors have not changed their prognosis and none of her health problems have changed. But she is better. She stayed up all night talking to him. She was more lucid than she’s been in weeks. She was in less pain than she’s been in for some time. She even threw a pillow at him when he made some obnoxious smart-ass comment about something. She was talking about a clinical trial she wants to pursue. She was miffed that everyone is believing what the doctors are saying!
THAT is the Gina I know. She sounds like herself. He said she even looks markedly better. I was blown away. Hope. It’s a beautiful thing. He sounded hopeful. She has a friend who has lived with bone cancer for several years. Apparently she was in Gina’s current condition at some point in the past. He tells me she doesn’t look sick at all today.
At first I was afraid to get too hopeful. Then I thought…why? Why in the hell not?! Even if our hopes are dashed tomorrow or even in the next 1/2 hour, why not revel in the hope while we can!
If anyone can pull off a miracle, this is the woman to do it. And if she does….I am in BIG trouble for having written about her impending death. I can live with that. 
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“Pain throws your heart to the ground
Love turns the whole thing around
Fear is a friend who’s misunderstood
But I know the heart of life is good”
- The Heart Of Life by John Mayer
It’s been over 24 hours since I’ve seen Gina. I find myself feeling more and more anger, sadness, guilt and sheer terror. I can’t seem to focus in on any one thought or feeling for very long. It’s all a jumbled mess, as I’m sure this post will be. I apologize in advance.
Continuum by John Mayer is my go-to album when I’m headed over that cliff leading to the dark side. As a result, I had to listen to it. Over and over. I also simply had to get rid of the horrific song that has been running through my head ever since Friday. Seasons In The Sun by Terry Jacks. I’ve always hated that song. It was released in 1974, when I was four years old. I must have heard it and understood it’s meaning at a young age. I cannot for the life of me figure out when I last heard it though. It has to have been years. I intentionally change the radio station on the rare occasion that it’s played. But there it was, running through my head for the better part of the past 3 days. It had to be replaced.
I finally settled on The Heart Of Life. It’s sad and hopeful at the same time. That’s where I’d like to be right now. I understand that it’s ok for me to feel profoundly sad about my friend and about my loss and her family’s loss. I also understand that life goes on. At least for the rest of us.
I’ve lived my whole life avoiding the dark side. I’ve self-medicated with alcohol, nicotine, food and other distractions. Over the past two years I’ve been working hard on living a more authentic life. I’m still learning how to recognize my feelings and deal with them in a more healthy way. What that means to me is to live in the moment. Experience whatever I’m experiencing. Acknowledge the feelings that come up. Allow myself to feel those feelings. Stop running. Stop hiding. Stop stuffing them and ignoring them and just….be.
I’ve been doing a fairly good job and making progress. Until now. I’m petrified to give in and allow myself to feel what is bubbling up under the surface. If I jump off that cliff and go to the dark side, what if I can’t get back? I’ve been to the dark side over much less upsetting things than the imminent death of one of my closest friends. It feels awful. At times it’s literally been debilitating.
I do have more resources now than I did then. I know more. I’ve returned from the dark side with lessons learned. I’ve changed a lot as a result. It still scares the hell out of me.
The only other person in my life who has died was my father. That was fully expected and a long time coming. I’ve lost distant relatives too. None of that compares to this.
I was shopping today for Thanksgiving items and it just seemed so absurd. How can I be buying pies and stuffing and shrimp trays when Gina is dying? It felt awful, as if I were betraying her. As if I wasn’t taking it seriously enough. I don’t know how I’m supposed to function at work this week. I have to do it. There’s no getting out of it. All I really want to do is camp out in her hospital room and hold on for dear life. I don’t want to leave her alone. I know she isn’t really alone, her family is there. I just want to be there too. I don’t want to let go.
When I think of her daughters I want to scream. It’s so fucking unfair that this amazing woman and mother is being taken from them. Death is never fair or even convenient but they’re just kids. Her husband, her mother, her sister and brother, her grandmother. Fuck. Her grandmother should not have to watch her granddaughter die anymore than her husband should have to watch his 40 year old wife die.
Then after bitching and whining about all this I feel selfish for having my own little pity party when so many other people’s lives are being affected in many more life-changing ways than my own. Especially Gina herself.
The dark side is calling. I think I need to just go and get it over with. I’m bringing John Mayer with me. I’ll be back.
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“Courage is grace under pressure.” — Ernest Hemingway
I feel a tiny bit relieved after seeing Gina today. My sister graciously volunteered to accompany me on the 2 hour drive and to be there with me for moral support. I’ve always been notoriously uncomfortable, anxious and many times, even nauseous, in hospitals, doctor’s offices and nursing homes. That was then. That was when we all spent most of our time in these places. That was when my father was sick.
It appears that I’ve grown quite a bit since then. I was anxious about going. I was afraid of how she would look. I was afraid she would be suffering. I was afraid she would be completely out of it. I was afraid I wouldn’t get to say goodbye. My sister and I talked about this all at length during the long drive.
The hospital Gina is in is amazing. It’s beautiful and peaceful. The staff is more accommodating than any other hospital I’ve ever been in. She’s in the best possible hands.
Her room was overflowing with people. People who love her. Family and close friends. They all graciously announced my arrival and stepped aside, allowing me to enter her room. She didn’t look nearly as bad as I had envisioned. After I carefully hugged her and we had a brief whispered conversation, I stepped away from the bed and she resumed the conversation with the group that I had inadvertently interrupted.
The doctors have said that she has a week, week and a half at best. She knows this. She was telling stories. Things that remind her of the people in her room. Stories about them that she remembers fondly. It was incredibly touching and gracious. She was saying goodbye.
My sister and I stayed for several hours. We talked with various friends and family members. We talked with Gina. I felt a tiny bit relieved to see first-hand that she is not in unbearable emotional or physical pain. They are keeping her comfortable. The combination of pain-killers and her body shutting down appear to be sparing her from the extreme emotional pain I would imagine goes along with the knowledge that she is dying. I got to tell her how much I love her. I got to say goodbye.
As has always been the case she seemed more focused on how everyone else was doing. It felt like a somber party with her as our hostess. There was laughter and there were tears. Everyone there was open and honest. No one was pretending everything was ok. Everyone was doing what they could for her and each other. We all seemed to be working on reassuring ourselves about her level of comfort while at the same time coming to terms with the fact that we may never see her again. Her grace helped me a great deal today, as it always has the entire time I’ve known her.
Her kids were on their way with their grandmother. It was getting late and we had a long drive home. It was time for my sister and I to leave. If she’s still there I’m going back on Friday. I went into her room to say goodbye but Gina had fallen asleep. She looked peaceful. She looked beautiful. I watched her for a few seconds. I hope I get to see her again on Friday but if not, I am eternally grateful that I got to say goodbye today.
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I’m still planning on going to see Gina tomorrow. There are no guarantees she will make it through the night. The cancer is in her bones. She has two different types of infections. She is still in the hospital on IV antibiotics and they are keeping her comfortable. She recognizes everyone but doesn’t understand why they are there. It’s for the best. The sheer pain and panic I hear in her husband’s voice haunts me. I feel an unbelievably strong need to see her one more time. I hope I get that chance tomorrow. I’m still in shock over how fast it all happened. I appreciate everyone who has called, commented and e-mailed.
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“Tell your friend that in his death, a part of you dies and goes with him. Wherever he goes, you also go. He will not be alone.” - Krishnamurti
There is one delusion, one giant denial, that all humans share. Death. Our own mortality. Of course we learn at a young age that we are all going to die. But we delude ourselves into thinking that we will all live to be 80 and die of natural causes in our sleep having lived a full life. We tell ourselves that parents die before their children. We have to buy into this delusion in order to function. It’s necessary denial. If we constantly believed and thought about the truth that we could each go at any moment we would be paralyzed with fear or we would never take responsibility for anything. We’d simply see life as being pointless since everyone dies in the end and there is no set time, place or means for any of us.
I’ve been avoiding writing this post for a week. Avoiding it has caused writer’s block as it always does. If I have something on my mind and I don’t write about it I can’t write about anything else. I have found that it always works that way for me.
In the past week I found out that my friend Gina, who has been battling breast cancer is not doing well. Her health has taken a significant nose-dive.
After finding out that the cancer had spread to her liver she started a clinical trial. Just like all the other treatments it worked at first. Then just like all the other treatments her body became immune and it stopped working. She had to stop the trial a week early because her platelets had dropped too low.
After two telephone conversations in which she did not sound at all like herself, the second of which was particularly alarming because she sounded completely out of it, unreturned texts, e-mails and voice mails, I contacted her family. I won’t go into all the gory details of her current symptoms because I know for sure that she would never want anyone to pity her. In fact, even in her current condition this desire to not be pitied is strong. I know it’s one of the reasons she doesn’t want to see me. She doesn’t want me to see her. She doesn’t want to see the pity in my eyes or hear it in my voice.
We’ve talked about her cancer hundreds of times since her diagnosis. We’ve never talked about her dying. A few times she’s mentioned what would become of her daughters if she dies but that has always been quickly followed up by a conversation about how that just can’t happen. I’m sure I didn’t pursue the topic because I don’t want to have to think about losing her and because I don’t want to force her to consider the possibility. Denial. In this case, it’s healthy denial. What good can come from her focusing on dying when she’s fighting so hard to stay alive?
Since I’ve learned of her current condition I’ve been forced to consider the possibility that she may die. I’ve been forced to consider the possibility that she may actually be dying right now. I hope it’s just a bad drug interaction that has to work itself out of her system that’s causing her current symptoms. It’s possible that it’s spread to her bones and even her brain. We have to wait and see.
All this time she’s been such a warrior. All the disappointments over the treatments that haven’t worked, all the bad news….through it all she has remained positive that the next thing she tries will work. Until now she’s always been upbeat and surprisingly healthy. She really hasn’t felt sick until recently. And now she’s extremely sick. And I don’t know if I’ll ever talk to her again. I don’t know if I’ll ever see her again. I don’t know if this is a temporary setback or the beginning of the end. I just don’t know.
Women our age, moms, are not supposed to die. It’s as simple as that. We’re supposed to watch our kids grow up and then travel, gossip and have fun together just like we always have. I’m not supposed to have to live the rest of my life, no matter how short or long it may be, without her. Denial.
I can’t even find the words to express how profoundly sad I am. How absolutely terrified I am. How much I hope she is not thinking about all this or in too much pain, physically or emotionally. How intolerable it is to know that she is. How much I want to see her, no matter what condition she is in. How much I don’t want her to die.
I hope this is a medication-induced temporary setback and that when she feels better she will read this and be pissed off that I wrote about her possible death. I hope she really lets me have it. But I just don’t know. Either way, a part of me is, and always will be, with her.
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Update 11/20/2009: She’s been admitted to the hospital. She’s not responding to transfusions. I’m going to see her tomorrow but I don’t know if she’ll be awake or alert.
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“You must remember, family is often born of blood, but it doesn’t depend on blood. Nor is it exclusive of friendship. Family members can be your best friends, you know. And best friends, whether or not they are related to you, can be your family.” — Trenton Lee Stewart
How do you define family? Is it as simple as including only people who are related by blood or marriage?
My mother, for example, seems to have a very strict set of rules by which she defines family. In one of the biggest arguments she and I have ever had she pointed out that I am only related to her sisters, brother and mother because I am her daughter. No, it wasn’t a childhood genealogy lesson. I was 27 years old. I had a pretty good handle on how genealogy works. The argument was about who was to be invited to my wedding. We disagreed and she said that her family would be upset with her if I didn’t invite some people that I was not planning on inviting. It was when I pointed out that it was my decision and that our family members would be upset with me and not with her that she felt compelled to point out that they were really more her family than mine. Why can’t memories like that one be repressed I wonder?
It’s not that simple for me. Of course my husband and kids are my immediate family, as is my mother and my sister who is also my closest friend. In addition to my blood relatives and relatives by marriage, I consider the majority of my friends to be my family. In fact, I am closer to many of my friends than I am to most of my relatives.
This is one of the things I love about my husband’s relatives. I’ve always felt like part of the family. His siblings, parents, aunts, uncles and cousins don’t have such strict rules about who is family. Many friends are called aunts, uncles or cousins even though they are not truly related in any way. They are still part of the family.
One friend in particular comes to mind as an excellent example of this. I believe we first came to know him when he became a high school friend of my husband’s brother. My sister met him at a party at my mother’s-in-law house and they dated for a while. Later, he and my husband became friends. Through various parties and holidays my mother-in-law became friends with his parents. We all became friends with his siblings and his girlfriend, who is now his wife. His youngest sister recently completed a high school project by working with my sister for a day. Our lives are all intertwined. They are all family. We’ve disagreed and bickered over the years. There was some awkwardness when he and my sister stopped dating and some more when he started dating his wife since he and my sister had dated yet were still friends. We all moved on from those things and continue to be close after all these years.
One of my girlfriends comes immediately to mind as well. We grew up next door to each other. She and I were roommates for 2 years. Her father gave the eulogy at my father’s funeral. We stood up in each others’ weddings. We’ve spent a lifetime together. Sometimes we’re caught up in the business of day to day life and don’t see each other or talk as often as we’d like. Sometimes we take trips together and see each other quite often. No matter what, we know we’re here for each other, to laugh or to cry with.
Related or not, the people whom you most enjoy spending time with, whom you care about and truly know…that’s family to me.
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“I’m giving thanks that we don’t have to go through this for another year. Except we do, because those bastards went and put Christmas right in the middle, just to punish us.” – Home For The Holidays
I’m certain I’ve used this quote before. I don’t care. If I could come up with a decent excuse I’d use it every day. I freakin’ love that movie. They’re so dysfunctional and real.
I’m starting to become disenchanted with the holidays already and we haven’t even made it to Thanksgiving yet. It’s so obligatory. There’s so much pressure. The expectations are so high and so different from person to person. I try not to get involved in any of the nonsense.
We’ve had Christmas Eve at our house for the past 8 years. Both sides of the family and multiple friends are invited. It’s worked out great. This year, hubby’s brother wants to have it at his house. He and his family just bought a house near us and are loving having parties. I resisted at first because I enjoy having it here. I finally caved because he can be, well….”persuasive”, and I figured why not let someone else deal with the hassle and mess for once.
Then the bossy-bosserman decided he wants all holidays at his house. Including Thanksgiving. My mother has Thanksgiving every year for my sister and her family and me and mine. It’s the only holiday she has. We always spend the day over there and then meet up with hubby’s family later in the evening.
Hubby’s brother does not like this one bit. He wants us at his house for dinner. In his defense, he did invite my mother but only after rigorously attempting to persuade her into giving up on having us over to her house. She flipped out, told my sister if we wanted to go to his house then she would just leave town and spend the day with her sisters and mother.
I agree that my brother-in-law can be pushy, but that’s just how he rolls. He’s not pitching a fit because she wouldn’t agree to give up Thanksgiving. He just gave it his best shot. Her temper-tantrum on the other hand, is so typical. And annoying. If she can’t get what she wants then she’ll just take her ball and go home. Ugh. Who knows what she’ll do now that Christmas Eve is not at her daughter’s house and is instead at my brother’s-in-law house. I know she isn’t happy about that but it was my holiday to give away and she is more than welcome at his house.
Apparently last year hubby and I had a spat right before leaving my mother’s house because I had thought we had to leave to go to his family’s at 6 but it was actually 5, and he mentioned that to me….at 5. I’m certain it was not a major blow up of an argument. Probably just some bickering over the correct time and most likely me saying he should have told me sooner. I’m told this was, “awkward”. Now, I’m no fan of public arguments but I don’t even remember this one taking place. And no, I was not drunk. I have no idea why I wasn’t. Note to self….drink more this year. But really, in the grand scheme of things, there is so much dysfunction and awkwardness at these things, could our bickering really have made such an impact that it’s vividly remembered a year later? Or is that just it….it was the only rational awkwardness, the only real conversation that took place that day that made it so memorable?
“Well, that was absurd, let’s eat dead bird!”
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“There are kinds of action, for good or ill, that lie so far outside the boundaries of normal behavior that they force us, in acknowledging that they have occurred, to restructure our own understanding of reality. We have to make room for them.” — Guy Gavriel Kay
I had no boundaries at all when I started dating. I had extremely low expectations about how I would be treated by men. Basically if a man was interested in me, was attractive and did not scream at or hit me, he was a keeper. One of the first guys I dated for any length of time during high school treated me like garbage. I only know that now. I didn’t know it then.
We worked together at a part-time after school job. We didn’t go to the same school. We did have some mutual friends. He asked me out and our first date was to be at a Halloween party. I was scheduled to work that night but called in sick. My boss, used to dealing with lying teenagers, gave me a hard time about it.
He stood me up. For our first date. I waited for hours making up excuse after excuse for his possible tardiness in picking me up and lack of communication about what was keeping him. When I finally stopped rationalizing his behavior I was devastated. I spent hours crying and trying to figure out what I had done wrong.
By the time I saw him at work a few days later I had already resolved to not let him know it bothered me at all. He did apologize but gave me no real explanation other than none of his other friends were bringing dates to the party. He said he still wanted to go out. I resisted for about a week but finally gave in and agreed. His chasing me was flattering. This time he was punctual. My parents loved him because he was tall, blond, good looking and behaved respectfully towards them.
He had recently been dumped by a long term girlfriend. She was a cheerleader. He was still pining over her. He even had a little shrine to her in his room complete with pictures of her and little mementos she had given him. It creeped me out but I rationalized this by telling myself it was a recent heartbreak that I would help him get over. Can you smell the co-dependency in the air even then?
His parents grilled me about my grades, what I wanted to do with my life and what extra curricular activities I was involved in. They were still pining over the ex-girlfriend too because they mentioned her and all of her activities often. I knew I could never measure up to her but I was determined to win them all over with my sparkling personality. The truth was, my after school activities involved making sure dinner was on the table as soon as my parents walked in the door and avoiding being hit or screamed at. I couldn’t exactly tell these fine, upstanding, cheerleader-loving people about that dirty little secret.
I can’t remember how long we dated but it was longer than I had dated anyone else. I was on the pill (that’s a post in itself) and decided I wanted to see what sex was all about. With him. I was extremely innocent, having done nothing more than make out with boys previously. I was curious and protected plus I figured he’d be less likely to dump me if we were having sex.
We were at his house alone one day making out on the couch when he suggested we go up to his room. I probably beat him up the stairs I was so eager to please. We were in bed, my clothes strewn about the floor of his room, about to do the deed when his parents came home early. He jumped out of bed, collected all of my clothes, threw them at me and pushed me towards the stairs telling me to get dressed in the bathroom downstairs and to hurry up. I did as I was told.
We went out once more after that incident, to one of his friend’s parties. He ignored me and flirted with some other girl the whole night. On the ride home he broke up with me. I acted like it didn’t bother me.
Once home I cried and cried, again wondering what I had done wrong. What I had done wrong! He had done everything wrong and wasn’t worth a second of my time. Reliving this is making me cringe. I want to build a flux capacitor, rent a DeLorean and travel back to 1986 to smack some sense into my 16 year old self. There are so many things wrong with the way I saw myself and my thought processes that I don’t even know where to begin. I shudder to think of what I would have become if I had had sex with him. I know I would have assumed that he broke up with me because I was bad at it and probably would never have tried it again. I’d be the creepy-spinster-cat-lady on the block most likely.
This all came up because I’ve come to the realization that I still have boundary issues and allow inappropriate behavior from men in my life. It’s not them, it’s me. I send off this signal that gives them the green light to behave badly. I allowed all sorts of nonsense from my own husband for years before realizing we had to change our relationship or end it. Luckily that worked out.
It’s other men in my life where I continue to find myself in uncomfortable conversations that I should not be allowing to continue. I was recently having a conversation with a man about a very serious and painful subject. He kept bringing the conversation back to sex. I kept laughing as if he were joking and then changing the subject back to the topic at hand. I made excuses for him since he is going through a lot right now. That’s horse-shit. I don’t care what he’s going through, nothing is a good enough excuse for this married man to be soliciting me, a married woman, for sex, “joking” or not.
This is not the first man with whom I’ve had these sorts of conversations either. That’s how I came to realize that it’s my lack of boundaries, not their behavior, that’s causing me confusion and feelings of being used. It feels just like it did to be the aforementioned asshole’s “girlfriend” back in high school. It’s time to challenge these “absolute truths” and stand up for myself once and for all. If I don’t insist on appropriate behavior I will continue to feel like that pathetic discarded 16 year old. I don’t need this type of attention from other men to feel validated anymore. It never validates me anyway.
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“Growing up happens in a heartbeat. One day you’re in diapers; the next day you’re gone. But the memories of childhood stay with you for the long haul.” – The Wonder Years
You know how all kids always deny being tired despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary? Well, that’s what this adorable little story on Nick Jr. is about. I don’t know what made me remember this story but I thought of it the other day. It was both of my boys’ first experience with the internet. Back before Steve abandoned Blue for a fabulous movie career (?!), and they were each around 2-3 years old they would sit on our laps and make us play this story over and over again. Both of them loved it.
I’m so happy I found it still up on their website so many years later! Whenever one of them claims to not be tired and they clearly are tired, we still say, “I’m not tired” in this little bird’s voice to this day.
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“The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances: if there is any reaction, both are transformed.” — Carl Jung
Yes I know I’m a dork but I just can’t get enough of these things!
Here are my (mostly accurate) results to the Jung Typology Test:
| Your Type is INFP |
| Introverted | Intuitive | Feeling | Perceiving |
| Strength of the preferences % | |||
| 67 | 75 | 50 | 33 |
Here is a description of INFPs that sounds fitting:
Idealist Portrait of the Healer (INFP)
- distinctively expressed introvert
- distinctively expressed intuitive personality
- moderately expressed feeling personality
- moderately expressed perceiving personality
Here are my (mostly accurate) results to the:
Idealists, as a temperament, are passionately concerned with personal growth and development. Idealists strive to discover who they are and how they can become their best possible self — always this quest for self-knowledge and self-improvement drives their imagination. And they want to help others make the journey. Idealists are naturally drawn to working with people, and whether in education or counseling, in social services or personnel work, in journalism or the ministry, they are gifted at helping others find their way in life, often inspiring them to grow as individuals and to fulfill their potentials.
Idealists are sure that friendly cooperation is the best way for people to achieve their goals. Conflict and confrontation upset them because they seem to put up angry barriers between people. Idealists dream of creating harmonious, even caring personal relations, and they have a unique talent for helping people get along with each other and work together for the good of all. Such interpersonal harmony might be a romantic ideal, but then Idealists are incurable romantics who prefer to focus on what might be, rather than what is. The real, practical world is only a starting place for Idealists; they believe that life is filled with possibilities waiting to be realized, rich with meanings calling out to be understood. This idea of a mystical or spiritual dimension to life, the “not visible” or the “not yet” that can only be known through intuition or by a leap of faith, is far more important to Idealists than the world of material things.
Highly ethical in their actions, Idealists hold themselves to a strict standard of personal integrity. They must be true to themselves and to others, and they can be quite hard on themselves when they are dishonest, or when they are false or insincere. More often, however, Idealists are the very soul of kindness. Particularly in their personal relationships, Idealists are without question filled with love and good will. They believe in giving of themselves to help others; they cherish a few warm, sensitive friendships; they strive for a special rapport with their children; and in marriage they wish to find a “soulmate,” someone with whom they can bond emotionally and spiritually, sharing their deepest feelings and their complex inner worlds.
Idealists are relatively rare, making up no more than 15 to 20 percent of the population. But their ability to inspire people with their enthusiasm and their idealism has given them influence far beyond their numbers.
Idealists at Work
Idealists, as a temperament, are passionately concerned with personal growth and development. They are naturally drawn to working with people and are gifted with helping others find their way in life, often inspiring them to grow as individuals and to fulfill their potential both on, and off, the job.Conscience looms large for you; in almost any situation, you feel compelled to measure yourself, other people, and the conditions of the environment against your personal morality. You have a tendency to perceive questions of meaning in even trivial matters and to worry about far-flung consequences of your actions. In your ideal job, you are free to pursue depth rather than breadth and quality rather than quantity. You feel rewarded when your projects and daily tasks allow you to immerse yourself in your process as deeply as you “need to” in order to satisfy your inner standards of quality. You are uncomfortable with the notion of authority per se and may avoid leading, as well as being led, either consciously or unconsciously. As you experience them, adhering to fixed roles and rules amounts to an abdication of your responsibility to exercise your conscience.
I found this particularly interesting: “Idealists strive to discover who they are and how they can become their best possible self — always this quest for self-knowledge and self-improvement drives their imagination. And they want to help others make the journey.” Ummmm….ya think?
If you are as dorky interested in these tests as me you can find these and many more here.
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