How do I know if I am "normal"?

[ar81]

Very often you see people saying that "this guy is weird", this guy is a geek, or a nerd or a freak or just not "normal". How do I know if I am normal?

I am interested in a few things:
1.Your definition of "normal".
2.Ways in which an individual is not "normal"
3.Psychological or psychiatric studies on what normality is or is not.
4.Why should anyone be "normal" or not? In what fields?

Of course you may add other ideas or tpics you consider interesting.

Please answer before reading these links.
How do 'normal' people feel about themselves? - Yahoo! Answers
I Just Want to Be Normal - Television Tropes & Idioms

I found those links after googling for an answer, but for some reason I do not feel they satisfy me.

[Mariana Trench]

I love the Television tropes site.

Cliche answer here happens to be right: there isn't really a satisfying definition of normal out there. At best you'll get average. And the average person has 1 testicle and 1 breast.

So don't worry about being "normal". From the things you mentioned though, it sounds like you're worried about not being socially awkward or incompetent. Often the people that weird others out are the ones that are clueless and/ or non responsive to social signals such as body language.

Asperger syndrome is an extreme example of that.

[Agota]

I honestly doubt there is such thing as "normal".

In my experience, most people who seem perfectly normal turn out to be either suffering from mental illnesses, depression or suicidal thoughts, doing magic, whether black or white, seeing ghosts, speeding up/slowing down time, looking up future, reading auras (or seeing them!), remembering their past lives, etc. People simply don't talk about these things because they're afraid that everyone will think they're crazy or laugh from them. I guess my attitude is responsible for the fact that people open up about that to me, even almost strangers: I'm totally unimpressed by all of that, since I regard things like that as completely normal. I believe if you'd be able to get people to open up to you, you'd soon lose the idea that people who are "normal" according to popular image of "normal" actually exist

[Mariana Trench]

Originally Posted by Agota

I believe if you'd be able to get people to open up to you, you'd soon lose the idea that people who are "normal" according to popular image of "normal" actually exist

Oh that is so true.

[taylor]

Normal is when you fit in.

Weird is when you stick out.

[ZephyrusX]

I think everyone has normalcy and deviance in them. These terms can be applied to so many aspects of our life so it doesn't make sense in my mind just to think of my self as either being 'normal' or 'deviant'. My sexual orientation is deviant, I suppose. Much of my life is rather normal though. I follow traffic rules. I keep up with my hygiene. I don't run around nude unless I'm in my own house/apartment.

I strive to walk some middle ground where I try to fit in (act normal) without sacrificing too much about my self that is deviant, and yet, important. Just because something is deviant doesn't mean that it is morally wrong. Likewise, something that is normal may not necessarily be morally correct. At least, not from my perspective.

[elucidate]

We're all weird...there is no normal except for the normal things we all do, like go to the bathroom, pay rent, eat, have sex etc. Many people have mental illness, many people are deviant in some way...that's normal for them.

[Acting Like Godot]

What's the use of being normal?

Being "normal", "typical", "average" .... well, nothing inherently bad about that, but nothing inherently good about it either.

Why wouldn't you want to be "special", "unusual", "rare" or "outstanding", in some particular way?

[invisiblehouses]

Whenever I think about questions of "normal" versus "weird" these days, I always go back to this dialog from the 1995 film Angus:

Mr. Kessler: Your hypothesis?

Angus: When a small abnormal element is forced into a larger normal system the element will either be rejected or destroyed.

Mr. Kessler: Obviously.

Angus: But it doesn’t have to be that way. If the element is...brave. If the element can hold out long enough and face the torment of the system until the systems energy is depleted. If the element can look the system in the eye and say ‘I’m still here a*****e’ then the system will have to change. Adapt. Mutate. And if this happens it would prove my f*****g point.

Mr. Kessler: Which is?

Angus: There is no normal.

[ar81]

I just had the idea that one cannot be normal. But I wanted to make sure. For some reason, no matter what you are or what you do, you become an object. An object called nerd, freak, geek, pop star, celebrity, teacher, police, or any other related term that makes people to be an object.

[Lauxa]

Normal is what people are before you get to know them.

[ButterflyWoman]

Originally Posted by ar81

Your definition of "normal".

Average. Typical. The middle of the bell curve. Usual. Non-exceptional. The majority.

Originally Posted by ar81

Ways in which an individual is not "normal"

Not average. Atypical. One or the other end of the bell curve. Unusual. Exceptional. A minority.

Originally Posted by ar81

Psychological or psychiatric studies on what normality is or is not.

I don't have that kind of information stored in my head for immediate dispensing on a forum. Google probably does, though.

Originally Posted by ar81

Why should anyone be "normal" or not? In what fields?

Be who you are. If you're normal, you're normal. If you're not, you're not. Normality is highly overrated, and so is being exceptional, so just be who you are.

Disclosure: I am not normal in most respects. I am exceptional in many areas, including at least one area of clear deficiency when we look at a bell curve of usual abilities. I AM a geek, a nerd, an eccentric, quirky, blah blah blah. So is my husband, and so are both of our kids (both exceptional in very different ways). I spent years trying to "be normal" and eventually worked out that it was not going to happen. I'm not. Then I went the other way and deliberately tried to be as different as possible. Eventually, that got tiring and I figured I'd just do what I did and be who I was and if I happened to be in step with the normals in some area, that was fine, and if I wasn't, that was fine, too. People think I'm weird, and I'm okay with that. I'd rather be who I am than try to conform to some imposed idea that says I should be like everyone else all the time.

Originally Posted by ar81

For some reason, no matter what you are or what you do, you become an object. An object called nerd, freak, geek, pop star, celebrity, teacher, police, or any other related term that makes people to be an object.

No, you don't. That's just a label that some other people put on you. Just slapping a label on something doesn't mean the label is correct, and it doesn't change the essence of whatever was labelled.

Labels are only useful for organising things into slots, groups, and files. If I put a label that said "Cinnamon" on a jar of Sage, would the sage turn into cinnamon? I think not...

[Acting Like Godot]

Originally Posted by ar81

I just had the idea that one cannot be normal. But I wanted to make sure. For some reason, no matter what you are or what you do, you become an object. An object called nerd, freak, geek, pop star, celebrity, teacher, police, or any other related term that makes people to be an object.

You could be a normal object.

[James81]

Here's a good test to see if you are normal. If you do any or all of these things (or have done them), then you are perfectly normal:

1. Breathe air
2. Eat food
3. Drink liquids
4. Sleep
5. Laugh, cry, get angry
6. "Use the bathroom" (because the word filters won't let me put the actual things you do in there )

There's 6 things right off the bat that every single human being does, and very few people ever stop to think about how that makes us all so damn similar.

Ok, so you think my list is trite and/or witty/smartassery? Here's some cultural things that make you like everybody else (and normal):

1. Get on the internet
2. Ever have to wait in line? Ever stop to think about WHY you are waiting in line? (Hint: Is it because there are a bunch of other people doing the exact same thing you are doing? )
3. Drive a car?
4. Go to work?
5. Use money to buy things?
6. Have a TV? (Watch it?)
7. Listen to music?
8. Get on the internet?

The list of things that most of us is staggering. I could sit her all day long and list things that pretty much most of us all do at some point or other in any given day/week/month.

And yet we get this notion that we are so different. That we aren't normal. That we are somehow weird or can't fit in. The truth is, you're all (every one of you that is reading this and everybody that is writing this ) very VERY VERY VERY VERY similar. In fact, the idea that you are different is one of our commonalities (which I find ironically hilarious!).

So what do you do with that knowledge? The knowledge that you might not be a "snowflake"? Rejoice! Be glad! You don't *have* to be different to be cool, great, special, or awesome. You just gotta be you. And only you can do all of those things I listed in YOUR way, YOUR time, and with YOUR perspective.

[Dreamweave]

I think a normal person is just a generic human sculpted by society.
Remember when women wearing jeans weren't normal?

but then again what do i know, i've been called creepy by alot of people so dont take my word for it

[Bradshaw]

Why would you want to be normal?

[alexplatups]

Originally Posted by ar81

Very often you see people saying that "this guy is weird", this guy is a geek, or a nerd or a freak or just not "normal". How do I know if I am normal?

I am interested in a few things:
1.Your definition of "normal".
2.Ways in which an individual is not "normal"
3.Psychological or psychiatric studies on what normality is or is not.
4.Why should anyone be "normal" or not? In what fields?

Of course you may add other ideas or tpics you consider interesting.

Please answer before reading these links.
How do 'normal' people feel about themselves? - Yahoo! Answers
I Just Want to Be Normal - Television Tropes & Idioms

I found those links after googling for an answer, but for some reason I do not feel they satisfy me.

Trust me, if you are asking this you are not normal! You are a lot smarter
than a normal person. Normal people don't aks these kinds of questions.

They just sort of go, everyone normal, but I am special !!!

[jellybeanpimp]

Normal doesn't really exist. There's too many different realities and little worlds going on simultaneously for there to be any defined rules for normal. The whole cheezy unique snowflake principle is true in my opinion, everybody has a unique fingerprint, a unique way of experiencing the universe.

You'd have to select a very specific group of people and say what is normal for that group, and the larger your population, the more general your definition will invariably end up being.

Just to give you an example, most of my life, whether working, socializing, even at home, is spent around gay people, in particular gay men. Probably much more than a usual gay person. Come to think of it, I have about 1,300 people on my facebook page, and well over 1,000 are gay men. I'm new to this site, and it's almost bizarre for me to read posts that are aimed at men here, because most of them are totally inapplicable to the men that exist in my little section of the universe.

Same concept goes with a lot of different things, no one can provide you with an answer for what normal is, period, they can only provide you with a list of qualities that conform to what their ideal is.

It's very subjective.