Yokohammer wrote:TennoChinko wrote:If you ever find yourself immediately answering a simple question to friends or family visiting Japan for the first time with huge chunks of detailed grievances that could have easily been ripped out of Alex Kerr's Dogs & Demons (which I still really like - being obsessed with it however isn't healthy) or Jared Taylor's Shadows of the Rising Sun , or realize somehow that your thinking, beliefs & perception of the world have become rigidly 'black & white' (a term called 'splitting') it's probably a good indicator as any that you need to take a long deserved vacation or otherwise change your environment or seek professional counseling before the bitter negative psychosis becomes permanent.
This is good advice.
The relative isolation that is an almost unavoidable aspect of gaijin life in Japan, whether you think you're fully assimilated or have naturalised or whatever, sometimes leads the more delicate psyches to very dark, miserable places. Keeping perspective is essential. If that means getting out for a while or making major changes to your lifestyle, that's what you need to do.
It would be good advice, if I were consumed by bitterness. I promise I'm not.