Hi hope you are well.

I have been trying to sort this out lately. I feel connected and disconnected from my homeland (my family has been in the US for about 400 years). I feel connected to the spirit of it, but since my childhood (about the time when my father passed), I have felt disconnected from the present state of my country and kind of only romanticize the past, if that makes sense. In a way when he died, I felt like I bit from the apple and realized how screwed up the world truly was and while I cope in my own way, I never have felt a connection to culture.

Recently, I have been going face to face with some things. I realize I project on to other women an image of my mother being judgmental of me asking questions. Because of this, I feel afraid to show my true self (express my wants and what I like) because it is too intellectual. That is not to say my mother would not listen to my problems, but anything related to symbolism or abstract ideas are "weird" and I honestly felt a mocking like how school girls would tease a boy at school, if that makes sense.

This changed due to two things. One, I was puking my guts out after a break up and a woman came up to me and asked if I was ok. That really made me realize that not all women are tyrants so to speak. I also saw a man dressed as Jesus walking by (I don't think it was Halloween, so I don't know what to make of it, but it was real). The second part was a female co-worker at work made me realize that I can be safe in expressing my views.

There was a third part and this is what is perplexing. I have been focusing on my world (picking up a second job and trying to master online marketing) and I have had women randomly approaching me at random intervals and places. I had also been working on accepting autism and how I can be eccentric in my world view. I accepted this is what I like and want and I don't need to be ashamed of that. I also promised myself to banish negativity out of my life as it causes me to drift (realized this after reading Outwitting the Devil).

This leads me to the larger issue. Sometimes I feel like the "world" and I are on different paths. I grew up Christian, fell away, and came back. Even though I allow people the space to be them, I still feel a disconnect between myself and the culture at large which might be in part due to religious upbringing. But even as I accept myself as I am, I feel more accepted by what I thought was opposed to me due to how I view things and my neurodiversity. I feel both a part of it but not if that makes sense. Another aspect is I also kind of decided to ignore the world around me, but as I did, it ran my way. What I thought of as a tyrant is, again, just a projection of my mother. I have been trying to deal with this, but not sure what direction to go.

TLDR: Long story short, dealing with my projection of my mother's judgement being displayed on to other women and dealing with what feels like a diverging away from my culture and how I feel inside, but then it converges. I don't know how to process this and maybe you could point me in the right direction on how to approach this. Thanks.