At some point in my life, or perhaps it has always been the
case, I started a war. A war between myself and the world of “other people”.
It’s been a very cold war. But tonight I feel like Reagan exclaiming, “Tear
down this wall.” This lonely wall of stone plastered firmly together with fear.
But fear of what exactly? This has been one of the hardest questions that I’ve
ever tried to answer simply because I had to face the fear in order to
recognize it for what it was. It took a couple recent conversations with
friends to help me start to get a firm grasp on why I’m so afraid. I honestly
still don’t think I have a full grasp on why yet, but I’ve begun to.
I’ve always been shy and afraid to try new things on my own.
I would say that during my whole life, fear has been a ruling factor whether I
was conscious of it or not. For those of you who don’t know, I’ve been
struggling with social phobia for quite some time. This has hindered me from
trying new things, going new places, meeting new people, getting to know young
men who I am actually interested in, feeling close in relationships, getting a
job (though I finally succeeded in getting one and I start very soon), etc… I’ve
written some pretty personal things on this blog, but for some reason, the
sentence before this one is one that I am having a difficult time not deleting.
I don’t know why it is so hard for me to be vulnerable about this particular
topic. I am terrified of others’ opinions, and I’m scared to reach out for help
because…I’m terrified of others’ opinions. I’m scared of being alone, so I push
other people who have the potential to reject me away, ironically leaving me
alone. I am my own worst enemy. And in the end, is it really other people that
I am afraid of, or is it myself? Or is it both?
It’s funny,
because I have family and friends, and I find that many are often not as aware
of the conflict that I feel I am having with them or the lack of closeness to
them that I am feeling. Do I just have higher expectations for relationships than
most other people? Are my expectations for myself and others in relationships
unreasonable? And finally, I ask the question, is a lot of this just in my head? To which I respond, “I think so,
yes, and YES!!
…It’s in my head and it traumatizes
my heart. My mental space is unhealthy and I have a heart-load of fears: fear
of failure, fear of success, fear of being forgotten, fear of being
insignificant, fear of intruding on people, fear of being alone, fear of being
with people, fear of pain, fear of knowledge, fear of being ignorant or naïve,
fear of being taken advantage of, fear of being gullible, fear of hurting
people, fear of looking stupid or like a freak, fear of blending in or being
just one of many, fear of caring more about people than they care about me, fear
of being trapped, fear of having nothing to ground me, fear of making mistakes,
fear of being rejected, fear of being hated, fear of being pitied, fear of
being looked down on, fear of people assuming false things about me, fear of
being unintelligent, fear of being considered immature, fear of being gross to
touch, fear of looking ugly or childish, fear of being boring, fear of
appearing arrogant, fear of trusting myself, fear of doing or saying the wrong
thing, fear of being known, fear of being unknown, fear of responsibility, fear
of losing people’s trust in me, fear of being predictable, fear of being
undependable, fear of not being unique, fear of being different, fear of
criticism, fear of being dependent, fear of appearing weak, fear of being
afraid, fear of not having an answer, fear of disappointing people… the list is
never-ending.
Besides my
fears of pain, being trapped, and being afraid, I would say that all of these
fears can be linked to one particular cause: I don’t know who I am and I’m
searching for my identity in the wrong places! Maybe one of the reasons why I’m
so obsessed with wanting everyone to be accepted for who they are and for
people to stop being judgmental is because I personally struggle to not aim this kind of judgment at myself. I am verbally abusive to myself. I can’t
even believe a compliment when it’s given to me. A compliment is almost
immediately followed by doubts of the other person’s sincerity. I always feel
like a scoop of some sort of disgusting flavored ice cream and when someone
decides to pour some delicious warm chocolate onto me, instead of melting my
heart, it solidifies and forms greater walls between me and the other person.
Bear with me if that metaphor was a little out there and didn’t make any sense.
I think the above scenario is caused by my inherent knowledge that others' opinions
of me are subjective. For example, one person might consider me far too
rational of a person while someone else might think that I follow my subjective
feelings way too far. Or what one person might consider a positive quality,
another might consider negative. If I’m always trying to look to other people
to define myself and know who I am, of course I’m going to be confused. If
everyone has different expectations about how I should act and I’m trying to
please every single person in the world, of course I’d feel totally lost and on
the verge of insanity. I have no grounding point to keep me steady. And on top
of everyone else’s opinions, I have my own too, just to add more confusion to
it all. My boat it tossing and turning with every crashing wave (aka opinion)
and my direction is never mapped “correctly” when I have a million people
charting my course, so how will I ever find the best place to land?
This
feeling of insecurity is the trigger for my anxiety. I’m basing my worth on
other people’s opinions of my performance. And because my mind tells me that my
value all hinges on my performance, of course I would be so intensely afraid of
others’ judgment, and of course I would be afraid of myself when I put so much
pressure on myself to perform perfectly when I know that I am not perfect. Of
course it would keep me from committing to things or allowing myself to appear
predictable, because if it looks like I’m not really trying for anything, there’s
no chance that people will see me fail. Of course it would make me feel
terrified of letting people close to me because I don’t want to hurt them
because I know that’s a possibility. As if other people don’t ever fail too…or
hurt me. Because they do. I hate to admit it, but it becomes, to an extent,
like a competition in my mind. I have to feel like I’m better than everyone
else, but I never am and I’m keenly aware of that. But I should remind myself
that they’re no better than me either! And that’s
okay!! Because we have things to work through and we all can accept God’s
grace! With God’s grace, the standard of perfection should no longer weigh our
hearts down. God accepts us if we try and succeed, and also when we try and
fail. Love can conquer.
I risk
sounding like a cheese, but the newer Disney movie Frozen really wacked me up the side of the head like when I wack my
frozen cd player in my car. I related so completely to Elsa in that, during my whole
life, I’ve been told that feelings are bad. That if I wanted to gain control,
if I wanted to not hurt anyone, then I shouldn’t feel. But killing my feelings
is impossible, so I push people away. I let fear of myself control my
relationships and shatter my confidence. I wear my gloves and hide behind the
gates. In analyzing all of this I realized that…
I am not afraid of
myself because I am powerless. I am afraid of myself because I am powerful!
I am not like Piglet, from Winnie the Pooh, shaking and
shivering at the smallest sound because I am a very small animal. I am afraid
of myself. To assume that my negative
decisions could have such an impact on people is to assume that I have power. To
think that whatever I do has potential to affect someone for good or bad puts
me on edge, always afraid to make a move.
In all of this, I have forgotten that there is One who is
more powerful still. Whatever power that I or anyone else might possess was
granted me by my Creator. Like Elsa, I need to embrace love to calm the storm
and melt the ice. When I look for my identity, I need to seek the love of God.
I am still discovering who I am, but I know that whoever that may be, ultimately
God has the answer, not the bajillion people around me, and not myself. When I
let him melt my ice-creamy goodness, I’m able to literally run free to others
with the love He has given me, leaving behind the gross chunks of cherry (I don’t
like cherry in ice cream, hehe) just like a melted glacier leaves behind the
rocks. I am made new. Crystal clear and shiny. And the newness can forever be renewed,
and love ever refilled.
Preach it sister!
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