Or so I have come to believe.

They call me a bad influence because my mere presence tends to affect people in highly unique ways.  I feed their subconscious or their repressed urges, simply in allowing my subconscious a certain measure of freedom and in not repressing my urges and emotions.  As a result, I have a BIG personality (as covered early on in this very blog) and one that many are drawn to.

The ego is a somewhat different thing, though.  It's not the typical ego that most people think of, in terms of talking bigger than I can back up.  It's simply a matter of knowing exactly what I can do and what I can do well, and not being afraid to promote those aspects.  It comes off as vanity, it comes off as egotism, but I don't think that those words actually convey the truth behind it.

I don't create reasons for people to like me.  I don't exaggerate my own accomplishments (though I may exaggerate for the sake of a good story), but I don't play them down either.  When I do something worth being proud of, I AM proud of it, and I don't care who knows.  When I do something spectacular, I recognize it as spectacular and want to share my own joy in a job done well.  I like when people feed that with acknowledgement, but I don't crave it or insist upon it.

Something I've started to notice, though, that ties in with the subject line and the "bad influence" bit is that when other people are around me, they tend to feel a little freer about promoting their own achievements.  It's not exactly a pissing contest, because we're not actually trying to best each other, but sharing stories of really cool things we've done.  Again, we do this without exaggeration (other than for the sake of the story).

I'm prone to talking about how much people love me...  and they DO.  There are very few people who find me utterly annoying and worth avoiding.  Sure, there are plenty who find me overbearing at times, and I can't think of *anyone* who hasn't just plain needed a break from me when it got to that point, but what you see is what you get with me, I don't have hidden motives very often, and I'm no good at keeping secrets.  What keeps me mysterious is the sheer amount of experiences that I've had that will only ever be recalled when the right question is asked, and few people are *that* good at asking the questions that spark those kinds of stories.

So someone said to me today, "You know, I'm not like this in real life.  I'm only like this when I'm around you."  But what struck me about that comment is how relaxed and comfortable he seems to be when he's "like that".  It feels like a natural state, not that I know him in his "real life", but I never questioned anything about who/how he is when I do see him.  I mentioned my working-theory about the ego being contagious and he seemed to accept that, but it keeps me thinking...

There are so many people in this world who are completely wrapped up in trying to be something that is either not in their nature or just not true to their [pick your word: soul/persona/being/self].  I'd even go so far as to say that most people have certain aspects of that, even if it's not the entirety.  We all hit it at one point or another, after doing the whole "growing up" bit, anyway.  There are certain things that are taboo, so we don't talk about them, we don't express them, we don't do them to the extent that we'd like to.

I strive to not have that.  I work at not being a slave to other people's expectations, at least when they conflict with my own.