Oh, angsty solitude!

Because it's the middle of the night, and because I'm sitting in a dark office on an empty floor of the hospital with nothing else to do, I find myself thinking.

As usual, my thoughts are of the best left unsaid variety, but, hey! It's my blog. My space on the great world wide web. My soap box. Hurray!

Primarily, I find myself currently thinking about the kind of person I am and the kind of person I wish I was. Now, overall, it's become a lot easier over the past few years for me to recognize my good points. Low self-esteem is a bitch, but she's been minding the leash a lot better these days, and thank heaven for it.

Of course, good points notwithstanding, there's a lot of room for improvement, especially since there's at least a couple of models for what I consider well-balanced people that can serve as a guide. Among the people I admire the most, several key points stand out:

• Confidence. Be it professional, social, self, or moral, the folks I admire the most have a lot of faith in their abilities grounded in reality. These are people who know their limits and are able to act with assurance within them and are able to ask for aid if necessary without qualms.
• High social IQ. In other words, the ability to interact with others from all walks of life and be able to find common ground, not to mention strong, healthy relationships with people of significance in their lives.
• Strong sense of self. Boundaries are necessary, and they know where their's are and are able to enforce them firmly yet kindly.
• Loyalty and sense of duty. They go above and beyond for those they love and/or are responsible for.
• Coherence. They can make a point or argument clearly and are able to defend their viewpoints intelligently.
• Organization. Both internally and externally, they've got their stuff in order.
• Style. Hey, I didn't say that everything here was deep. The shallower stuff needs improvement too. And interestingly, among the people who have a lot of the other traits I admire, they've got style, too.
• Independence. They aren't afraid to make their own path, even if there is a lot of muttering and naysaying from the peanut gallery of life.

Is there overlap in many of the above? Yes. Is it a complete list? No, but my pager keeps going off and interrupting my musing. But it's a start.