That’s conflating what people present to the world with their mind. It’s a very shallow understanding of what’s going on.
Regularly BASE jumping is seriously dangerous to the point where almost nothing else people do that’s “living on the edge” really compares. Think active war zone levels of danger, but they don’t need to dress up in spikes to show off how edgy they are. It’s possible to come off as a calm high school librarian while still being an extreme adrenaline junkie.
Next time you walk past a middle aged banker type in a sports coat consider they could be a furry, you just don’t know. Assuming someone seeming normal is actually normal is being blind to the possibilities.
>> That’s conflating what people present to the world with their mind. It’s a very shallow understanding of what’s going on
I was trying to contrast the external and internal presentations of self, not conflate them. My point is that a "normal" external presentation doesn't make someone a "normal" person. Someone can act, consume, and behave certain ways that help them feel normal, but in the end it's a coping or survival mechanism of sorts. If I fit in with the "in" crowd it affords social and economic status. That's the version of "normal" my comment was responding to.
The only way to define normal is the external representation, you never see the internal one.
Therefore someone that seems normal to all appearances is normal. If in the privacy of their own mind they pray to the invisible fairy living in their left nostril, well how do you know that’s not what 90% of people do?
Regularly BASE jumping is seriously dangerous to the point where almost nothing else people do that’s “living on the edge” really compares. Think active war zone levels of danger, but they don’t need to dress up in spikes to show off how edgy they are. It’s possible to come off as a calm high school librarian while still being an extreme adrenaline junkie.
Next time you walk past a middle aged banker type in a sports coat consider they could be a furry, you just don’t know. Assuming someone seeming normal is actually normal is being blind to the possibilities.