This isn’t going to be to everyone’s taste, and I admit it’s over the top even for me. However, it got me thinking about how it really didn’t matter if other people liked it or not (apart from James seeing as he lives here too.)

Years of worrying if others opinions would change based on my taste.

As a teenager I remember being so confused about how everyone could give each other a hard time about something simple like what music bands they liked. I worried about being the butt of the abuse so much, I rarely named any that I actually liked. It was the 90’s so brit pop was ruled by Oasis and Blur, and somehow a cultural developed that you had to be in either one camp or the other. Personally I liked both but was slightly more drawn to Oasis, and so if asked that’s the camp I was in. That meant if a Blur track came on I couldn’t be caught tapping to the beat or humming along otherwise I’d be caught out as migrating to the other side.

This made me feel like a fraud and that I should have definite ideas on what was my taste. But in honesty I didn’t follow music just because a particular band or artist had created it, it was just if that individual track resonated with me. Between this, and worrying about being caught out for liking the wrong stuff I rarely bought CD’s. (Yes kids this was before we could just download a track. We either bought a “single” for what felt like a lot for what you got, or you went the whole hog and bought the album.)

How I’ve become uninhibited thanks to brain injury.

One day someone close to me commented on that fact that I love to wear clothes with fun prints on them: like flamingos or pineapples. They said how I’m actually quite childish. Initially I took offense to this. It sounded like that where calling me immature and putting my down. But later I realised that actually what they meant was that I was fun and uninhibited like a child.  Whereas before my brain injury I was a woman in her 30’s who had confidence and knew her own mind, I was still concerned with image. I needed to come across as professional, and I didn’t think flamingos necessarily fit the bill (no pun intended.) 

As I’ve slowly regained some confidence following my brain injury, I’ve come to realise that I don’t have to worry if others don’t agree with my taste. Yes I might be a bit eccentric, but so was Einstein.  Thinking back to when I was a teenager I desperately wanted to be one of those rare few who didn’t care what people said about their choices. Being different and just comfortable with who they were was actually much more attractive than the rest of us sheep who where just followers. Perhaps that’s what a life changing event does to people. Silly things like worrying if another person would like my crazy shed becomes trivial when you’ve gone through so much. I have touched on this a little before in Complacent but not carefree after brain injury which I wrote around 3 years ago. Then I was generally struggling more than I am now, so I put my almost slap-dash attitude down to necessity because I needed to pace myself better. However I now see that it’s do to with my perspective on life and finding enjoyment where you can too.