Tongue-Tied

Friday, October 31, 2025

I recognize the tingles, the mope, the tightness and the stings. I can pinpoint these sensations to crossing the railroad tracks outside 兰亭山水 heading towards 南沙街. I’ve been here before.

When I don’t feel new anymore, and I feel there’s no one to ask how I am, and there’s no one to listen to how I am—how I really am—when I do start talking. When I don’t want to be asked of anything by anyone, and yet I still want to be needed and asked, and become sad when I’m not asked. When I am extra sensitive about the enthusiasm with which others text me or make plans with me. When I fulfill the need, and am not showered in appreciation.

It seems, then, that I base my relationships on being needed, and by how much. I value the friendship I extend by how much I can do for them, how readily I am there for them. If I cannot do something for them, then I am a bad friend. If they cannot be there for me “in the rare times that I need them for”, then they are a bad friend. I base my relationships not on simply feeling easy being myself; apparently, that’s not enough. These are standards that I have held to. No wonder I feel stressed and want to hide away.

In turn, I do hide away and become a bad friend. I pick and choose the values when convenient for myself, like how Mum says I do with the Chinese and Canadian cultures. I text back instantly when my help is needed, or when I can tell no obligation is needed from me; I delay when my help is not needed, or when I can’t tell if obligation is needed from me. My baseline for respect in these interaction changes, and that inconsistency comes back to bite me in the butt. 

Fear of rejection is the ultimate culprit in my mind. If I text with warmth (as I understand it to be) but am responded to with efficient coldness (as I understand it to be), I feel jipped because my enthusiasm feels unmet, feels rejected. At the same time, trying to remind myself that my understanding of what is, probably, is flawed and limited to my own style. So I run away to interaction in person, but until then, I wallow in fighting off the feeling of rejection, and whichever poor soul that texted me must wallow with me in the uncommunicative darkness.

But there’s so much that I can control. I can be myself and be appreciated.  I can need others. I can also reach out to create opportunities to be myself. I can say what I want to say straight, as I’m saying it, instead of letting the thought of saying it loom over my head for days. If I offer warmth, I can do it simply out of my own appreciation of warmth, that it’s part of my own values, and not in anticipation of reciprocation. That regardless of what comes back, I will offer it anyway. If I seek warmth, I can communicate it, courageously, without fearing failure in the search. And I can be consistent in showing respect.