A fresh start
It has been about a year since I wrote my last article here. Though I’ve had some ideas, they did not form in the end. So it’s time to make a fresh start, introduce myself and start writing again. Through writing and conversing in reactions, I hope to grow in understanding and provide similar growth to others. So leave your thoughts, ideas, comments in reaction under the article so that growth can be stimulated.
So who am I? Though I don’t define myself as a static being set in stone, there are some things noteworthy about me and to provide the viewpoint from which I write. I’m a white male living in the Netherlands. This means that when I write about topics connected to racism or gender, this is my reference. The same goes for being a hetero cis person. These facts mean that I can’t intrinsic understand what racism feels like or what it means to be born in a body that doesn’t fit your gender identity.
Furthermore, I live in the Netherlands. That means that discussions, laws and cultural context might be different from my audience. In the US (where medium is most popular I believe), the debate around racism is much more polarized and fierce than in the Netherlands. Another example is gun control. In the Netherlands, guns are forbidden and there is no debate even comparable to the US (and no talk about something like the Second Amendment, which we don’t have or have had). These differences are important to note for my articles.
Other personal aspects also influence my writhing. I work in the mental health care system and have been a heavy mental patient in the past, mostly connected to self harm and suicide. Having been in the system gives me a different perspective from those who have not and now working in the system does the same. Next to that, I’m also poly amorous. Meaning that I believe in having multiple, fulfilling relationships simultaneously. This is something I’ve been writing about in the past and was the main focus of my medium writing. Now it would just be an aspect of myself and a part of the broader scope of things I’ll write about.
Now that you know a bit about my background, it’s time to state what I’ll write about. Truth is, I’ll write about various topics and don’t limit myself. However, I’ll have three main focus topics: philosophy, mental health and relationships. Mental health requires a trigger warning, because the main theme there is around self harm and death. Two heavy topics that can hit home for some. But I believe that things must be said and hard truths should not be avoided. No sugar coating the message or tiptoeing around sensitivities some might have. The world is a hard place. Pretending like it isn't, doesn’t help anyone.
My aim is to publish something at least once a month. Sometimes it’ll be personal or more from a distance view. Important to me is to try to make it understandable by anyone. I’m not a fan of philosophers who write so complex that it looks more like an attempt to use as many complex words as possible, than writhing an understandable perspective. Not my style, so I’ll try to keep it understandable and to the point. Enjoy whatever there is to come and contribute where you can.
