Behavioral Reflections

I'm in a good mood today. And I'm kinda hyper. I always feel that when I'm hyper, I'm annoying someone. This is due to the fact that my actions while in a hyper state consist of the following:

• random comments
• random dancing
• randomly jumping into converasations
• randomly jumping out of conversations
• randomly touching people
• random singing
• being random

I have enjoy doing these various activities. They're fun and funny, but I get this nagging feeling that I'm getting on someone's nerves. But I somehow feel that just asking the general public if I was being annoying would somehow be.... annoying. I dunno why; I'm just weird like that.

Of course I could try not doing these random things, but that's who I am. When I was younger, I transfered from a private elementary school to a public middle school. While I remembered some of the people from lower grades, I didn't really know anyone. So I took the quiet root. I didn't really make friends, people just sort of accepted me as the nice, quiet smart kid. I was playing it safe, not taking chances.

My move to Owensboro in mid-seventh grade brought about pretty much more of the same. I was still the nice, quiet weird guy. But I gradually found a group of friends that helped me to change that. I started to get more out there; I took more risks in my behavior. I wouldn't over-analyze every little thing. I just did it. Thus stands the young man you see before you. Or rather, thus writes the young man you read about before you.

Moving on to other thoughts...

I think what drives me is the desire to always execute the correct action. I learn what is right from my past experiences and the reactions of those around me. One of the most instant forms of gratification is laughter. Thus, making people laugh is a satisfying, efficient way of telling whether or not people approve of what you're doing... or at least, to create the illusion of approval. Therefor, I constantly strive to make people laugh.

I'm unsure of whether I enjoy the act of bringing laughter to people, or if I have a constant need for attention. It could be both.

I also have problems really connecting with people. When a certain level of seriousness is reached, I sort of fritz out. I don't know what to do.

Another thing: I custom tailor my actions to fit whoever is around me at the time. Sometimes I don't know if I'm acting like myself, or if I'm just being what the other person sees in me. I'm not really sure who I am. I sometimes don't know if I even have a personality; I could just be robotically responding to external stimulus. But is that not what personality is? We are defined by the choices we make. The question is, am I making my own choices; or am I making the choices that others expect me to make, or the choices that would just serve to make them laugh, or the safe choices?

Looking back, it kinda sounds like I'm extremely succeptible to peer presure. I hadn't considered that angle before. But that doesn't sound right to me. Most would say that I'm not exactly a normal person; I wholeheartedly support this statement. But could it be a sort of 'higher level' peer pressure, one that's subconscious? It's a possibility.

Despite these doubts, I'm happy being me. I've made mistakes, but not regrets, cause every wrong choice I make teaches me how to be a better person.

And that's all I really want: to be the best person I can be. =]