8.17.20 // "normal"

How often do you question, what is "normal?”
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"Normal" in your vocabulary, your choices, your culture, your society, and your life.
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Normal in the sense of what you approve as "ok" in your mind and judge when someone doesn't fit the mold.
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For me, I don't question "normal" nearly enough.
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I have moments when I'm painfully enlightened to how often I utilize "normal" in my life. In those moments, I actively try to break my use and understanding of "normal", but there are also times when I slip out of that painful enlightenment to comfortable ignorance or status quo.
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I use the word "painful" with enlightenment because being aware of unhealthy patterns is hard, trying to change the status quo of my mind based on previous challenges and traumas are, for lack of better wording, fucking taxing.
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But, committing to breaking "normal" is critical.
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It is critical because "normal" keeps people in boxes, it keeps humans in "easy to understand" assumptions that are dangerous to others and poisonous to your mind. It lets us pass judgments based on our own dialogues and keeps those most fear-inducing actions at bay: change, realizing and admitting we are wrong, and admitting we don't know something.
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But, leaning into those fear-inducing actions actually lead us to a type of life that is more fulfilling. It brings us back in time, from rational adults to curious children. It opens our horizons again and lets our imaginations run wild and our stigmas dissipate in the wind.
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If we removed "normality" from our lives, societies, religions, and cultures, our judgments would break, and our freedom to experiment and live the life we live in our wildest dreams might be possible.
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It's a big ask, I know this, but even if we just start realizing "normal" as it exists in our current lives, we can start to understand and move towards that accepting world.