I’m Not Shy Anymore (Or: Why I Find It Hard To Be Mysterious)
I think it is who I was and who I know I could be that is saving me. But it’s not who I am.
(Though it shouldn’t ever be who I am that is saving me… I know, I know it should always be Him.)
I depend on that person sometimes. I depend on the loving person I was trying to become all the while currently living a life not quite of love. I depend on the exercise I know I could be doing, but I’m not doing it. I rely on what I knew and what I could know. I depend on talk but no action.
I have this picture and this ideal person in my mind. I’m not trying to better myself now. I forget “little by little” and want “big, now.” Because the person in my head, even the person I was, seems unattainable these days.
I’m 21 and some days I feel like I’ve hit my prime. I mean, 2008 was a great year.
(I’m being dramatic… It’s part of who I am.)
I need to face it: THIS is who I am and what I’m doing. If I’m not satisfied with that, if that’s not what I want to be, then I need to change.
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I once had a pastor who during a sermon said, “God didn’t create people to be shy.”
I was a shy high schooler when he said that. It puts in your mind the idea that this part of you, this thing about your personality, wasn’t created by the God you worship. The God who created you didn’t mean to create that part of you.
There was a friend of mine who told me once that it’s good to be mysterious. “They like mysterious.” “They” being men, of course.
I wasn’t mysterious when she told me this. And so my confidence that had grown as I felt more and more like “me” was shot down a little when I was, once again, not something “they” like.
I once was shy, but according to someone’s words, I shouldn’t have been. I was probably more mysterious then though.
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I found a comfortability in who I was and what I looked like some years ago. I think that’s when I grew out of my shyness (which could also be labeled “my fear of society being against me” or “the fear of every joke being on me.”) I had my “moments,” but I pushed through them. On a regular basis, I was reminding myself or being reminded of my worth. And that worth wasn’t based in friends or the glance of a boy. And those reminders weren’t just on Sundays.
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“WORTH. Girl, let me remind you of your worth! Your Dad is a king. KING! You know what that makes you…”
It may sound silly. Sure. But I often come back to that table outside of Coffee Cafe that night after all the shops had closed. Joel spoke such truth into my life throughout our friendship.
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For awhile now, it seems as though I’ve had my “moments” of being comfortable in who I am. For a little while, insecurity became who I was. I wasn’t believing it when I tried to remind myself of my worth. I didn’t believe people, if anyone was reminding me.
Some days I wish I could just hide things as well as most humans, it seems, can hide things. But only some days.
Many days, I’m still in the middle of those two, it seems. The moments of my days sometimes feel split down the middle by the Rachel who loved herself and others more than not, and the Rachel who shrivels up on the inside when she is reminded of the society we live in and their definition of worth, beauty, etc.
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I’m sure I’m not the only one who sometimes feels beneath the world and beyond anyone’s second glance. I hope I’m not (and yet wish I was) the only one.
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I wish I was mysterious some days. Other days I like the honest and open life I live. Plus, I’d rather be what feels right — and hiding things, not responding to questions, acting aloof — those things don’t usually feel right. Being honest, being open, saying hello to random people when we make eye contact… Those things feel right.
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Ah, but it’s all a journey. None of that stuff up there is finished. And, in all honestly, I’m sure the music I’m listening to and the mood I’m in has made some of this sound a little more on the down side of life than necessary. Oh, but it’s all real. Someone out there has felt it too.
