DIARY I keep saying and thinking ‘when I’m settled in’. To living in Cambridge, that is. I use these words to defer certain expectations – this or that will happen ‘when I’m settled’. But I’m not sure what that will look or feel like. The opposite of agitated? Is it me that’s settling, like a leaf on the ground, or is it that my contents are a kind of churned riverbed, a cloud that needs to become a steady layer of sand? Once things stop catching me off guard or causing me trepidation, I will be settled – in which case, I can’t remember the last time I was settled. I’m a worrier – I worry about and at. I’m very suspicious of long silences.
I think a lot of the problems caused by bullies or abusers in exalted positions come from a sort of identity whiplash. Many speak of unhappy childhoods or being bullied or misunderstood themselves, and for one reason or another they didn't process and deal with that trauma before being handed heaps of riches, adoration and clout. Suddenly drunk on their new cultural wealth, they behave like an entitled child and convince themselves they are still the victim and not the aggressor (they think in binary terms), because that bruised-kid part of them has not been healed or developed, just tooled up with power.
Plenty of people are bullied, hurt or ignored as children and grow up into kind, caring people determined never to pass on that pain. It's down a combination of personal choices, neurological predisposition and outside factors what happens next. But as you say, we can't build someone into a god and expect them to feel answerable.
I think a lot of the problems caused by bullies or abusers in exalted positions come from a sort of identity whiplash. Many speak of unhappy childhoods or being bullied or misunderstood themselves, and for one reason or another they didn't process and deal with that trauma before being handed heaps of riches, adoration and clout. Suddenly drunk on their new cultural wealth, they behave like an entitled child and convince themselves they are still the victim and not the aggressor (they think in binary terms), because that bruised-kid part of them has not been healed or developed, just tooled up with power.
Plenty of people are bullied, hurt or ignored as children and grow up into kind, caring people determined never to pass on that pain. It's down a combination of personal choices, neurological predisposition and outside factors what happens next. But as you say, we can't build someone into a god and expect them to feel answerable.