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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13801
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It is a case of making a decision. The decision to become confident is the tool that allows confidence to be created.
"I am confident from now on" does not hold true the moment you say it. But it holds true increasingly as time passes. It is not a lie, it is a tool. In the same manner that you use a hammer to knock a nail in you use the decision in order to permit yourself to become confident.
I hear people say "bullshit", as I did at first, but you can't lose a thing by doing it. Do it and, when it works, you will be happy. Don;t do it and always wonder if it might have worked.
Do not mistake a veneer of confidence for real confidence. I remain unconfident in certain social situations, the false "business social" ones, but they are false anyway, so I do not count them. There I appear confident, but I just hate them!
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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JimB
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Likes it here |
Registered: December 2006
Messages: 349
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A reunion is a way of celebrating those grand days of youth and visiting with friends from that time. But those days weren't so grand for you and they were your tormentors rather than friends, so why would you want to attend? I'm sure you have actually changed a lot but the hurt is still there and why revisit it in a very real way?
I've never attended a high school reunion, it just isn't my nature to look back in that way.
JimB
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Macky
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Really getting into it |
Location: USA
Registered: November 2008
Messages: 973
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I have always thought that jazz was a more emotional music. When it is happy, its very very happy. When its sad like Blues it's very very sad and you almost want to cry. I suppose that I would have been curious about what naked boys from different ethnic groups would look like too, I was just too scared to be able to enjoy it.
Behold, how good and how pleasant it is
For brothers to dwell together in unity!
Ps 133:1 NASB
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Macky
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Really getting into it |
Location: USA
Registered: November 2008
Messages: 973
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I've read books, listened to tapes, and spent a lot of time searching for techniques and magic bullets. I just can't get my mind off of myself when dealing with people. But you are right, the only thing to do is never slack off and always try to be yourself and say what you want to say without regard for how anyone takes it. I understand it, but it's hard to do. There are social situations where you should not say what you want to say, like business socials LOL. Trouble with me is I can't figure out those grey areas where I wonder when it is OK to say or do what I want and when it is not.
Behold, how good and how pleasant it is
For brothers to dwell together in unity!
Ps 133:1 NASB
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Macky
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Really getting into it |
Location: USA
Registered: November 2008
Messages: 973
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I'm with you JimB. I have never attended and I am pretty successful at expunging high school from my mind until every 5 years when they send me an invite. Forty years has taken me from hate to extreme dislike of those people. It's not a good feeling to dislike these people who might even no longer exist. Maybe by the time I'm dead I'll be at peace with them.
Behold, how good and how pleasant it is
For brothers to dwell together in unity!
Ps 133:1 NASB
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Macky
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Really getting into it |
Location: USA
Registered: November 2008
Messages: 973
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The hormone bomb was set by evolution to go off at the optimal age. But society is so structured that the hormone bomb does not mesh with social structure or norms. The result is nature pushing young boys toward sexual activity and society proscribing the same. This is very tormenting for kids. Society has to make an allowance for this.
Behold, how good and how pleasant it is
For brothers to dwell together in unity!
Ps 133:1 NASB
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At the beginning of the last century children left school and started work aged 13 / 14 and adolesced at 16. The irony is that now the average age of puberty seems to be 13 and very few start a full time job even at 16.
Hugs
N
I dream of boys with big bulges in their trousers,
Never of girls with big bulges in their blouses.
…and look forward to meeting you in Cóito.
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I have just attended a 45th reunion. Great to see the chaps again. They were good mates all those years ago, but now it's just hello, goodbye, see you at the 50th.
Hugs
N
I dream of boys with big bulges in their trousers,
Never of girls with big bulges in their blouses.
…and look forward to meeting you in Cóito.
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13801
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Say what you need to say for the situation, having regard to the needs of the other person. If you do that then you are truly in control.
Forget manuals, tapes and the rest, simply be the best YOU that you can be, and choose to be confident
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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Macky
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Really getting into it |
Location: USA
Registered: November 2008
Messages: 973
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Very interesting. Do you have a source for that info. I guess the effects of evolution can be superceded by the effects of better nutrition or something. That would mean that technology has driven the age of puberty downward, as we learn to feed ourselves better. Who is to say that puberty did not coincide with manhood stature in the deep past. That would be a moral basis for changing the culture to allow children some sort of safe sexual expression! Technology makes them mature faster, maturing faster gives them a sexual appetite, yet society proscribes satisfying that apetite. There is something immoral in that scenario.
Behold, how good and how pleasant it is
For brothers to dwell together in unity!
Ps 133:1 NASB
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Macky
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Really getting into it |
Location: USA
Registered: November 2008
Messages: 973
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It's a nice reminder of how fortunate you were to have had them though. When you are a little different, those good chaps can be very cruel.
Behold, how good and how pleasant it is
For brothers to dwell together in unity!
Ps 133:1 NASB
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Macky
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Really getting into it |
Location: USA
Registered: November 2008
Messages: 973
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I have always felt that if someone has a keen understanding of something, they should be able to get their point across in a sentence or two. So I'll be asking myself what needs to be said for me to be me, in order to enjoy the company of people.
Behold, how good and how pleasant it is
For brothers to dwell together in unity!
Ps 133:1 NASB
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I would NOT like to be 14 again, it was the WORST time of my life and I am so glad that I am past it. I have learned to NOT live in the past and move forward because I had to or no longer exist.
As there IS no going back and I try to a realist, I have persisted the last 6 years or more moving away from a past that almost destroyed me. I live for the now as much as I can and I try to forget the frightened little 14 yr old I was, it WILL never come again so wishing it back would prove less cathartic than people would think.
Now I have had my little rave, I hope that you don't think this was a negative response to your post but just my view of this question.
People have a habit of changing your direction through life
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Macky
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Really getting into it |
Location: USA
Registered: November 2008
Messages: 973
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Quite to the contrary Ashley. Look at my post "I'll stand pat at 58." and you will see that your opinion of the past is very much in line with my own. The graph of my life's wellbeing would be much higher at 58, my present age, than it ever was at any previous age.
However, would your opinion still be true if you could go back knowing everything you know now? For me, it wouldn't make any difference. Childhood sucked, and having changed little as an adult, going back it would still suck.
BTW, I am very sorry for whatever happened to you to make 14 so bad. It should have been a happier time (for both of us).
Behold, how good and how pleasant it is
For brothers to dwell together in unity!
Ps 133:1 NASB
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e
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On fire! |
Location: currently So Cal
Registered: May 2002
Messages: 1179
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Hi Ashley,
Nice to see you around the board again. I've often wondered what had become of you. I do remember that you went through a very rough time back then. Looking forward is a good thing.
14 was the start of the worst time in my life, though some parts of my life were getting better, other parts (what would be more important later on) were beginning a downward spiral that has never really stopped. My self-image was shattered in a number of ways. Fixing it is one of the reasons I'd like to go back to that time. I have no idea whether things would turn out better or worse, but I somehow think things could be different. Oh well, can't happen.
Think good thoughts,
e
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ray2x
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Really getting into it |
Location: USA
Registered: April 2009
Messages: 430
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I wasn't afraid to listen to jazz but I had to do the listening at home. If I felt like listening to a Duke Ellington album, I did so. Later in my life, I discovered several classmates also loved jazz as we found ourselves attending jazz concerts.
It was easy looking at boy bodies. I guess I found a guilty pleasure to enjoy at my leisure; however to share that pleasure was as remote as taking a trip to the moon. Not as easy as enjoying jazz music.
Raymundo
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ray2x
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Really getting into it |
Location: USA
Registered: April 2009
Messages: 430
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Ashley, nice to meet you through the post. I don't really know you well. I am a bit opposite and hope not to offend but the teen years were rather OK for me, tough and often troublesome years though. But I do understand your feelings. I have posted having a troubled friend during this time. He was a great friend as we were opposites too but we just hit it off well.
As for remembering the past, I often take cues from past events, whether personal or global and apply them to present situations. I've always remembered a quote at the National Archives in Washington DC "What's past is prologue". And to me that means I take all of the past, good, bad, ugly, weird, or whatever and that is what helps me navigate my present life.
Thinking about 14 again meant that what was happening can be a useful tool for my present situations. Of course, the hurtful, bad stuff is painful. WE did make it through those times.
I do get much criticisms for my beliefs from my wife and some friends. I hope you can offer good critical comments as well (not hurtful ones
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Raymundo
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13801
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Most people do not grasp succinct explanations and need a more handshake style conversation.
If you are an expert on rocket propulsion and I am not, however brief your explanation and however succinct, you will not get through to me until I truly understand. Instead you will set me against rocket propulsion and probably against you as a consequence.
So you need to assess my understanding without making me feel stupid, and guide me to the answer.
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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No source, Macky, just general knowledge, reading, observation and talking to older people when I was younger.
Hugs
N
I dream of boys with big bulges in their trousers,
Never of girls with big bulges in their blouses.
…and look forward to meeting you in Cóito.
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13801
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The things that happened to you were things I would not wish on an enemy.
If I could do it I would give you back your childhood, this time without the pain and without the later torment that was inflicted on you.
I would give you the teenage years you deserved and had stolen from you.
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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I've just remembered. At the age of 14 / 15 I suffered from chicken pox and a lasting plague of boils. Whatever happened to boils and their big brother the carbuncle? I am lucky to have forgotten most of the bad things about adolescence.
Hugs
N
I dream of boys with big bulges in their trousers,
Never of girls with big bulges in their blouses.
…and look forward to meeting you in Cóito.
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