Shut it down.

"Am I shutting everything down?"

"Yes.  You are."

I'm still laser focused on this question and answer.  Because it's true.  I am shutting everything down.

And fuck if I'm going to stop right now.  I'm way too angry, and I think that's one of the major ways it comes out.

I mean, hell, I just cancelled out on a trip tomorrow because I just want the time alone. 

It's been a fucked up week for me.  Just stress, and not having any down time, and I was supposed to go to Breitenbush for a week starting Sunday, and that fell through, and...

and I am feeling like a brat.  Like an inconsiderate, selfish person just being difficult for the sake of being difficult.  Oh, poor me... poor me... now leave me the fuck alone while I wonder why no one will talk to me.

I am just not that good at being angry... in the moment.  I don't really know how to do it... I mean, I guess there's no fucking manual or procedure or anything, so I guess I'm just afraid of what will happen- who I'll hurt, and what will be the repercussions, etc., etc...

Although even that feels like a smoke screen.  Maybe its that I just don't want to stick my neck out that way.

I took a quiz on facebook the other day... which sounds like an updated version of all the crap in Cosmopolitan.  Well, nerdy Cosmopolitan...

The quiz was which Star Trek character you would be.

And my match- over 80 percent:  I'd be a red shirt.

A red shirt.

(For those nerd-impaired, a red shirt is the one on the show who you had never seen before, and who always went on the missions away from the spacecraft.  They were also the ones who got killed within five minutes of landing wherever their mission took place.  You could spot them by the red uniform shirt they'd be wearing.)

I am Mr. Reliable.  I am Mr. Understanding.

I help others so I don't have to focus on myself, and the fact that I don't have much of an identity at all.

I sacrifice myself for others, because I believed there was some sort of identity within that sacrifice... which is bullshit.  Its just a way of saying CODEPENDENT.

So, ever since that stupid quiz, and giving myself a lot more time for thinking, I am shutting things down.

I shut down my website.  Helping others is great, especially for money!  But... not until I'm clear with who I am and what those boundaries are.

And then I started to get into a spree of shutting things down.  Online, mostly.

No more LinkedIn.  No more Twitter.  And cleaning up all the different accounts I no longer want to have to deal with.

If I can't isolate myself by going to Breitenbush right now, I can start shutting down all of the things that push me into an identity that may or may not be me.  I'll have time later to open things back up.

Here's the thing, though... the question and answer weren't even about these things.  It's about how I shut down help.  Advice.

If you're already angry, and doing a damned good job of covering up your anger, advice is like a solar flare. 

Even if its good advice.

You can imagine what my therapist is going through.

(Guess where the whole shut down question and answer came from...)