One Hates Most In Other People What One Fears Most In Oneself

I've been thinking over this a lot lately for a cruddy reason: when I was 21 I had an abusive alcoholic partner. "I'll never be like that", said I, "drinking every day, drinking alone, forgetting stuff, slurring, god he's disgusting".

Now, ten years later, I'm acting so much like he did back then its as if I've been forced to "walk a mile in his shoes" to understand. Although, I dont go nuts and shout abuse at anyone when I'm sloshed ;)

But yeah. Theres loads of other things in other people that shit me that I then sagely realise I'm the worst offender of.

However, what I fear most in myself is rage, anger, poor impulse control.

The irony being that one of my most pronounced character traits is *not* lying, of being utterly honest and forthright, even when it gets me into trouble. (especially when combined with that rage and poor impulse control I mentioned above.) Whatever else I might be, I am not a liar. (Though perhaps I sometimes fear I may be guilty of unintentional hypocrisy.)

Maybe the disparity is not as acute as it seems - in fact, perhaps the two faults might be seen as opposite sides of the same coin, or opposing ends of a spectrum.

As to the second part of the question, I'm more interested in what others have to say.

I am certainly uneasy around people who have made life choices that I myself feel that I lack the courage to make and i tend to shy away from people who have got themselves into situations I fear. I am tip-toeing around specificalities I'd rather not get into on the board though.

I don't dislike people because they're too much like me. The things I try to avoid in myself are talking over/interrupting people - I think I sometimes have a tendency to assume I know what point a person is making before they say it. It infuriates me when someone does it to me and I'm an awful lot better at listening now than I was when I realised I was prone to it when I was a teenager. But I am always practising with varying degrees of success. Other things that wind me up about other people are laziness, which I'm definitely prone to, and supporting the Conservative party, which I'm not. I am tolerant of other people's views generally but the particular brand of Conservatism I find very difficult to listen to is "I'm a success so anyone who isn't must be not trying". That's something I've never been able to think and it's the characteristic that provokes disgust. Almost everything else provokes a shrug.

If anything, it makes me cautious. I suppose it makes me realise the precariousness of my own situation.

I think it's especially a certain kind of weak resentful dependence (all three together - I don't mind weakness, or dependence, or resentment on their own) that I hate most in other people because I can feel it in myself. I do pity people for it, but then I begin to further dislike them for being pitiable - for using their pitiability, their patheticness, as a survival tactic. Though of course I don't know if they really do use it so, if they do it intentionally, or if I'm just aware that I would were I in their situation.

There's one particular person I know who displays this sort of bitter lame-duck dependence, and I can get savagely angry when forced to spend long periods of time with them. It makes me all the more impatient, I think, and a lot less forgiving, since I've convinced myself that this person is transparent to me (even if I'm just reading my percieved bad trait into them). I think I'm scared that prolonged exposure will bring that trait back out, or make it visible to others.

Usually, though, I like people whose behaviour I feel I can aspire towards, and dislike people who I think are like me.

(And this realisation will make me pay more careful attention to the advice I give.)

So I'm wondering if I do that. Well, of course I'm sure I do it, totally subconsciously, like everyone else does. So if I wish for insight or solutions to my *own* problems, I should check the advice that I give others.

re the initial question though,
I am a troubled jealous type, and when I see this in other people I cringe with terror because not only do I see painfully clear how pathetic I am/have been and all my jealous tantrums in the past, I also feel paranoid that other friends around me will see the connection and remember all the awful things I have done. I know, what a bloody ego eh.

I hate it when people hint but don't post.

I completely agree with this and it was one of the hardest things to take on board about myself.The things I fear in myself are what I react incredibly badly to in other people. So now when I hate someone, it makes me realise what git-like behaviour lurks in my own soul. And then I worry about it.

A natural candidate for expensive psychotherapy, me, I think. But one of the things I hate in other people is excessive introspectiona nd self analysis. There you go, I've just proved my own point. Argh.

These are unpleasant characteristics, I don't think either is what I fear most in myself. I don't know anyone who displays the things I most don't like about myself. Regarding the second question, I probably would feel sorry for someone who did. Certainly I will defend people (who I don't know, on tv or some acquaintance) who others condemn as being that way.

The people who I described above, though, I feel more anger and frustration towards.