Feeling Disconnected from Cultural Obsessions
Sometimes I feel shame when I watch certain stories. For example, The Wizard of Oz is a story that has been retold many different times, and it feels like people are obsessed with it, and I just don't understand it. I feel a lot of self-consciousness around certain cultural obsessions that I just don't relate to, and I feel like it has to do with what happened in my life, that I just don't emotionally relate to it. So right now I'm about to watch the movie Wicked, and I noticed some resistance as it was starting, as I felt a pressure to suddenly find some kind of meaning in this, and to join the crowd in cheering, yay, another story about the Wicked Wizard of Oz.
ChatGPT: That makes a lot of sense. It sounds like there's a deep layer to your reaction, beyond just not liking The Wizard of Oz or Wicked. There’s an underlying feeling of alienation—a sense that other people are tapping into something collectively meaningful, and you’re on the outside, unable to access that same emotional resonance. And it’s not just about this story; it's about a bigger pattern of disconnection from cultural touchstones that seem to define shared human experience.
The pressure to get it or feel something when others do is a real thing, especially when you suspect that the reasons for your disconnect are tied to your own history. Like, if your life had unfolded differently, would you be part of the crowd cheering for this? And if you're not, does it say something about your ability to experience things fully or belong to the broader human experience?
I wonder if there's a way to watch Wicked (or engage with any of these cultural obsessions) without demanding an emotional epiphany or a forced sense of belonging. Maybe you could frame it as, I don’t have to relate to this the way others do. I can just observe how it makes me feel—whether that’s boredom, interest, confusion, or something else entirely. You don’t have to join the crowd in cheering for it. You can just be a visitor, seeing what all the fuss is about. And if it doesn’t resonate, it doesn’t mean anything bad about you.
If anything, your awareness of this dynamic—your ability to articulate the feeling of resistance, pressure, and alienation—is a sign that you’re deeply engaged with the experience of being human, even if that engagement doesn’t look like collective enthusiasm.
