I was at lunch with some friends the other day and I noticed something. As much fun as I was having with them, I noticed how surface-y the conversation was.
It’s not that I want deep, introspective conversations at every mealtime or get together. It’s impossible to do that with such big groups of people. Sometimes you just want light and fun conversation where you can forget about things that are troubling you and you need an escape. And sometimes you just don’t want to talk about yourself and you don’t want to hear about everyone else’s heavy stuff. Sometimes it’s better to keep a distance so you don’t get too involved.
At the same time though, it made me realize that a lot of people don’t really know me. Sure, people see me every week, we talk, we hang out. But I also realize that they don’t know me. I don’t get asked questions beyond normal chit-chat. And a lot of time I do the exact same thing. I’m not sure if people either don’t know what to ask or if they read my blog and think they don’t need to. I’m not the type of person to volunteer information either. I figure if you wanted to know, you’d ask and if you don’t ask, then you don’t want to know.
For example, I have a good feeling a lot of folks have no idea that I’m divorced. It’s not like I walk around introducing myself like “Hi, I’m Deborah. I’m divorced.” I’m not trying to hide this fact about myself. It’s just not something I’m going to voluntarily bring up the first time I meet you or even on the first date unless the conversation leads in that direction. People just assume I’m single and never been married because I will admit, it’s how I act. Since kids weren’t involved and it was done very non-messy, there’s nothing really to indicate anything else. While statistically and legally I would have to classify myself in this way, I don’t live my life based on this label. There are different connotations to just being single and being divorced. Again not trying to hide anything at all. It is just something that I don’t bring up unless I have to. 9 times out 10, it is not something that has to be brought up.
And yet it is a part of me and I feel like if you don’t know that part, you don’t really know me. For folks that know me in person, if you’re reading this and made it this far, if you want to talk, just ask me. I’m more than happy to talk.
I’ve been thinking lately about how I would like to share my testimony with people. It’s been a while since I shared it and even then it was only with a select group of people. I know that sharing how I found and lived my faith is something that is very important. It’s not something where I’m like “turn and burn” after you hear this. It’s more of I know that what happened in my life affected my faith and my faith affected what happened in my life. But I’m worried about telling it. I feel like I’m going to get judged by a lot of Christians when I share it. Why? Because it’s a messy story. It’s not something that they are going to be able to relate to. They’ll hear my story and it doesn’t matter if they know me or not, they’ll make snap judgments about me.
Someone asked me “Why do you want everyone knowing your deep secrets?” The answer to that is I don’t. Not everyone needs to know everything about my life just like I don’t need to know everything about theirs. But the parts of my life that I do feel I need to share, I want to share. Just have to figure out a way to properly do so.
Come and hear, all you who fear God; let me tell you what he has done for me. (Psalm 66:16)
It’s really funny how I’ve been told that I am both super quiet and need to come out of my shell and how I also need to just stop talking. Usually you’re one or the other. Yet since it’s me, of course I can be both.
When something is new to me or I’m placed in a situation where I feel uncomfortable or it’s something new, I tend to clam up. I would much rather not draw attention to myself. In situations like this, I tend to be quieter because I want to get a feel of my surroundings before I start to open up. I also am the type of person that usually isn’t good at jumping into the conversation without prompting. Some folks are excellent with just bulldozing their way into a conversation and will talk over others. I seem to not have this ability so I’ll wait for the pause before I give my two cents.
It all adds up to me being seen as someone who is quieter.
And then there are times where I cannot seem to shut up. I notice this is when I start being more comfortable around you. I don’t say awkward SOAP moments. I just for some reason can’t seem to stop talking. It’s like if something happens to me and it’s usually either good news or something that makes me a bit anxious, I seem to want to tell everyone about it. Sometimes it’s to get an opinion on what to do, sometimes it is to brag, sometimes it is because I just want to tell anyone who will listen.
There are many times when I wish that I could just bottle it in and not feel the need to tell everything to people. And the thing is I can. There are some things in my life that I will never share. There are some things I only share with those I’m close to. There are some things where I am totally open to sharing but again, only if prompted. I really envy those of you who have things happen and instead of projecting it outward, you absorb it completely until it vanishes.
Working in customer service puts you in a place where people feel the need to tell you everything that’s going on in their lives and on their mind. When you apologize to someone, why do we feel the need to have to explain everything? I know some people aren’t good at reading social cues or faces to tell that the other person doesn’t want to hear more than what is necessary, but what excuse do the rest of us have? Why do we keep talking and have words keep pouring out of mouth when we can clearly see the other person just does not want to hear what we are saying?
The obvious thing is to just assume that no one else wants to hear your sh*t. Ain’t nobody got time for that.
Or I could just go back to writing in my journal whenever those impulses hit and wait to share my news with the people who really do want to hear them. I’ll figure it out. I always do.
I’m currently in the middle of my annual reading/listening to the Harry Potter series and I’m smack dab in the middle of Goblet of Fire. Harry’s about to do the first task and in addition to worrying about who put his name in the cup and how on earth he’s going to defeat dragons, he has to worry about his friendship with Ron. Because Ron doesn’t believe him, thinks he is lying, and is jealous of all the attention that Harry is getting. As the story is told from Harry’s perspective, it’s still incredibly frustrating to read about unfairly he is being treated. We as the reader know why Ron feels this way (youngest boy after five older brothers) and yes, the characters are just teenagers. But what Harry is going through is also painful to read because he cannot control the circumstances and his best friend refuses to stand by him.
How many times have you gone through life and someone doesn’t believe you even though you are telling the truth? It’s one thing when it’s people who don’t know you that well. These people make snap judgment and unfortunately since they have no way of knowing what you are really like, changing their minds is nearly damn impossible. Hopefully your life doesn’t depend on their opinion (ie. they are the jury and you’re the defendant) so while it sucks, this usually isn’t that big of an issue.
But it’s a situation like Harry’s, when someone who is supposed to know you extremely well stops believing in you, that hurts like hell. And almost every tie there is nothing you can do about it but wait and hopefully the truth will come out. It’s extremely frustrating to feel like you need to make them believe that you are not lying especially when you know fully well you aren’t. It gets worse when they think they know better than you and taunt with that type of behavior.
Being believed is something that is very important to us. When we know we are telling the truth and when someone WE trust does not believe us, it is like a betrayal. For whatever the reason, the other person has lost THEIR trust in us. Even if it is warranted, to not be believed probably hurts more than having actual angry and hateful words said to you. You know it’s bad when you need to say to someone “You have to believe me!”
I don’t know why as humans we are so doubtful when it comes to believing others. I think it comes from not wanting to be gullible. You don’t want to be seen as the fool for believing someone and it turns out they were lying and you now look like the fool. Also sadly people do lie all the time and try to purposefully manipulate someone’s trust only to break it. We need all the facts and see all the proof before we want to trust.
And then there are those times when someone does believe us. We don’t have to try to defend ourselves or prove the truth. And that is one of the most wonderful feelings in the world.
I was reading some old journal entries the other day (which I won’t be using excerpts because…well, I’m lazy and don’t feel like transcribing at the moment) and I noticed that something that came up A LOT was that when it comes to any sort of relationship in life, the number one thing I look for is honesty and being able to trust someone.
Due to past circumstances, I need that to be solid in our friendship. If I feel that you’re not being honest, it’s not going to go well with us. No we don’t have to tell each other EVERY SINGLE secret ever. But at the same time, if there is something important going on in your life, if we’re truly friends why aren’t you telling me about it?
Even if at one point, I told you not to tell me about that very thing, you should. Thank you for respecting my request, but at the same time is it really fair to sacrifice your own happiness? No because we’re adults or at least we should be. And I honestly would never want any one I consider to be one of my closest friends to feel like they have to hide things from me that make them happy. Because eventually it’ll come out and then the person will wonder why you felt like you couldn’t tell them. Don’t hide your happy relationship from a single friend. Don’t hide being pregnant from someone who can’t have kids. Don’t hide your new job from someone who is unemployed. Honestly (heh), if your friend truly wants you to be miserable just like them, then they aren’t really your friend.
It’s one thing to be vague and avoid saying direct answers with people you don’t know very well. They’ll never know and most likely will never care that you didn’t tell them the truth. But when you do that with someone who does know you very well and trusts you…well you just can’t.
Trust is something that is so important to me. If I can’t trust you, I can’t have any sort of relationship with you. I try not to be a very suspicious person but trust is something that I don’t give away very easily. And when I do trust you, I basically trust you with my life. When you’ve reached that level and you break that trust? There’s no going back. It’s over.
The holidays are coming up. This means that most people will go back to their hometown to reunite with family and friends. Everyone will catch up and reunite and for the most part it’ll be good to see everyone again.
I realized the other day that though I go home every year, I usually just spend time with my family. I never seen anyone else. My life is up here and not back there. Other than seeing what people are up to on Facebook (and not even actively communicating at that), I have lost touch with many of the people I was friends with in school.
Everyone’s all doing this
and I’m all like
I’m not really sure when it happened. I know it all started when we split up for college. Everyone went their separate ways, found new friends, and started new lives. Even though we got together when we were home for breaks and holidays, it was never the same as it used to be.
I realize that people have families of their own now and that is their main focus. But I also realized that there are still tons of people (and not just those that I grew up with) that are still good friends with their childhood friends. They still stay in touch constantly, still make an effort to actually see each other in person, and are never out of each other’s lives.
Part of me wonders if maybe I wasn’t as close to my friends in high school as I thought I was. Was there something wrong with me that no one wanted to stay in touch? I mean heck, I have no idea if/when my senior class is ever having a reunion because not a single person has contacted me about it. Confession: Since graduation, I was invited to ONE wedding from someone I knew high school. To be fair, and probably because of that, I barely invited any of them to mine but considering the results probably for the best. Meanwhile I see my current friends share wedding, baby, pretty much all life announcements of their old friends all the time. I see other friends post pictures of our mutual friends from high school getting married and obviously I’m not there for it.
It sometimes makes me feel forgotten. That people don’t care about what’s happened in my life to reconnect with me. But I’ve come to accept that those relationships are all over and not a part of my life anymore. Maybe I should have reached out more, maybe others should have done the same thing. Maybe I still could. I don’t know. I’m a drastically different person that I was back in the day so the me that people knew back then is not the same one that exists right now.
I’m good with where I’m at in life and my current friends have been fantastic and I know God’s placed them in my life at exactly the right time. I know I don’t have to keep looking back at the past.
Have you ever decided you wanted to do something and you think “I like to do this with a bunch of people. They’d probably enjoy this too!”? So you come up with a list of people who you really want to invite and perhaps add a few backups just in case the A List can’t make it. Then you decide to send out your invites either via email, text, Facebook messenger because no one really does snail mail invites anymore for non formal events.
Because you want to save time, you just send out one mass invite to everyone. Should be easy right?
Wrong.
You can’t send out group invites where everyone can see that other people are invited. It just doesn’t work.
You’re not going to hear back from everyone. Some people are going to reply, others will not. They will think they don’t need to because someone else will.
If they can see the guest list, there will be times when they will make their decision on who else is coming first. Unless this is something that they really want to do or they really enjoy spending time with you, these folks will NOT make their RSVP until they see who else is coming. Who’s going to be the first to push the button?
People also hate the reply all button. And unless you are using a platform like Facebook messenger which allows you to opt out of the group, you are stuck getting tons of text messages or emails that you do NOT want. It’s a pain to keep getting messages from people you don’t know especially when you can’t tell who it is. And since you never really wanted to be included on this in the first place, you’re really not going to reply back with a positive answer.
So what’s the trick to getting people to go out and do something with you?
Be super popular and be so cool that EVERYONE wants to be around you and asks YOU to hang out with them so much that you just decide to ignore people when they want to hang out with you.
Just kidding (sorta).
You have to be pro active about inviting. People are always going to have plans. Even when they don’t have active plans, sometimes if they don’t hear about anything going on they will just plan for a night in. Making last-minute plans can sometimes work, but if you know you want to do something in advance, you need to act early on it to make it happen.
You have to plan wisely. Realize that not everyone is going to be able to everything.
Also, DON’T SEND OUT GROUP INVITES. People will get irritated with YOU for putting them on that list in the first place. They don’t want
If you MUST send out a group email, do what you do at work, and just BCC everyone. So what if people don’t know who else is coming? Unless they are totally freaked out or disgusted at hanging out one on one with you (then which they really shouldn’t be your friend in the first place), should it matter?
Basically just use judgement. Don’t include people on group texts, emails if you know they won’t go. People shouldn’t feel left out if they know they can’t come.
Personally invite each person that you want to go with you. Yes, this will take up more time and it’s not as convenient but it probably will get better results. People (despite everything we say about not having enough time or being too busy) still enjoy one on one personal interaction with people they care about. You may have to make the list smaller if you, yourself, are short on time.
It’s still not guaranteed though. Nothing is certain. You can personally invite someone, get a response, and they STILL leave you hanging.
I don’t remember exactly when I started using AIM but I think it was my senior year in high school. My family didn’t subscribe to AOL on a normal basis but every now and then we used the free trials from those CD roms that always came in the mail. Therefore I knew all about how to use Instant Messenger.
I used the screen name ‘beatccr’ for several years. I had created that name freshman year in high school because I was a fan of The Beatles and Creedence Clearwater Revival. After a while I decide to change things up and switched it “I Worry Easily”. Yep. That was a thing for a few years.
Listening to these sounds brought back all the memories.
I entered college RIGHT at the peak of the use of AIM. Everyone was on it. You could hear those blips and bloops as you walked through the dorms. Even if you were in the same room with someone you still IMed them. The best would be when you messaged someone across the hall about getting dinner and they yelled back at you.
I went through several color palate and font changes. It was like trying on new outfits until you find what suits you. Away messages was where I posted all my emo song lyrics. I would like to apologize to all the people who kept seeing Dashboard Confessional show up in my messages every other week.
There were so much passive aggressiveness in my profile. I never called out anyone but a lot of stuff was clearly directed at certain people. 98% of them never said anything about it. But I’m pretty sure that they knew it was about them and didn’t give a _____.
Anyone else put up that link where you could stalk whoever checked your profile? And you didn’t put it so it was super obvious. You did it in a Rick Roll type of way and then you’d try to figure out who were these random people who found your profile.
Do you remember buddy icons? And how you had to pick the perfect one in order to fit your personality? We used to visit sites like BadAssBuddy to get them.
The longest I ever stayed on AIM was at least 44 days 3 hours 57 min. That meant that I never turned off my computer for a month and a half. Also that the power never went out for that long either. Oh those were the days. Also when you had to go somewhere else, like the library or math emporium, you’d get on AIM express so you could always stay in contact with people.
I made (and lost) a lot of friends because of AIM. Some of them I still talk to though we’ve moved onto different messaging platforms. In the past three years I’ve been using Gchat but it’s not the same and I think the novelty is also wearing off. Not everyone uses it and I think that it’s dropping
Sigh. Real time chatting online is now a thing of the past now that we all text with each other. I guess I could also talk to people in person.
Have you ever read something and you felt like OMG this is totally speaking to me. That this must have been written for me. And you wonder why on earth you didn’t know about this before? And then you want to tell everyone about it even though you know it won’t have the same impact on them that it did you?
This happened to me the other night when I finally read So Long, Insecurity by Beth Moore. I normally don’t read a lot of Moore’s books. I once did a Bible study of hers but it was quite long and there was a lot of “homework” involved. It had been sitting in my library TBR pile (which seems to be never-ending) but over the weekend something happened that made me feel like God wanted me to finally read the book. And I started and finished it in one day, which is really rare for me with non fiction books. Apparently I really needed it.
While almost the majority of everyone deals with some type of insecurity (there may be a lucky few of you who don’t at all), we all don’t suffer for the same reasons. What may bother you might not bother someone else. And we may not be able to understand someone else’s issues.
Insecurity is a very ugly thing and causes us to act in ways that are not appealing. A lot of times we really try to hide the fact that we feel this way. For me, a good bit of my insecurity is coming from wanting to feel like I’m normal and not standing out, but feeling like I’m failing immensely. Part of this comes from growing up and physically standing out of the crowd when I wanted to blend in but instead got teased for it.
As an adult, I’ve learned and accepted (though you may not believe it) that I’m unique and it’s perfectly fine that I don’t share the same interests or characteristics as everyone else. As I stated last week, I’m happy with the person I’ve become and while I want to make myself a better person FOR myself, I’m cool with what I do.
It sound silly, even to me as I type this, but I struggle with wanting to just be seen as normal. I feel when I tell other people about things I like or something I’m excited about, other people don’t seem to care. I think because I care so (ok, too) much about what other people think I tend to notice facial expressions or pick up little things more than others. I notice when someone darts their eyes away, gets restless, looks bored, sighs, changes the subject, etc.
Or other people, because they aren’t as interested, tend to knock down things I talk about. This may just be their personality but to me it feels like what I am excited about isn’t worth their time. It’s one thing when I tell a random stranger and they don’t care. But when I tell someone who I do care about and their reactions seem to be bored or uninterested, I feel like I should just shut up because what I have to say isn’t interesting to them. Instead of lashing out, I tend to withdraw.
I realize my personality is different from others. I may also act in different ways than other people. If someone doesn’t like something I do, while inwardly I may think but why not?!, outwardly I’m not going to tell them they are stupid for it. If someone likes something that I don’t, while I may say I don’t like it I won’t tell them it’s stupid. I’m so worried about feeling stupid in front of other people who I would never want to make someone else feel that way because I know how horrible that feeling can be. I feel empathy towards people. I also may overly project how I feel on others.
Anyways all this can lead to some of the feelings I have about being insecure. So when I picked up the book and started reading it, it was like reading a book directly written for me. It’s good to know then that I’m not alone.
I tried not to quote the entire book but these were some of the passages that REALLY stood out to me.
Men are not our problems, it’s what we are trying to get from them that messes us up. Nothing is more baffling that our attempt to derive our womanhood from our men. We use guys like mirrors to see if we’re valuable. Beautiful. Desirable. Worthy of notice. Viable. We try to read their expressions and moods in order to determine whether it’s time act smart and hard to get or play dumb and needy. (page 7)
Are we honestly going to insist on drawing our security from people – men or women – who are oblivious to the inordinate amount of weight we give to our estimation of us? (page 9)
Insecurity refers to a profound sense of self-doubt, a deep feeling of uncertainty about our basic worth and our place in the world. Insecurity is associated with chronic self-consciousness, along with a chronic lack of confidence in ourselves and anxiety about our relationships. The insecure man or woman lives in constant fear of rejection and a deep uncertainty about whether his or her own feelings and desires are legitimate. (page 17)
The insecure person also harbors unrealistic expectations about love and relationships. These expectations, for themselves and for others, are often unconscious. The insecure person creates a situation in which being disappointed and hurt in relationships is almost inevitable. Ironically, although insecure people are easily and frequently hurt, they are usually unaware of how they are unwitting accomplices in creating their own misery. (page 23)
We can be so blessed in certain relationships that our unrealistic expectations often seem met and, therefore, reasonable. We can get away with thinking we’re secure people because, for a time, we have the important things just like we want them. But then change happens, and suddenly we are thrown for a severe emotional loop. We realize we weren’t secure. We were spoiled. One way we can detect insecurity is by our knee-jerk reaction to any level of change in a relationship, particularly if we perceive that the focus has shifted away from us. (page 25)
Overwhelmingly, the men used one word to describe what they do when they feel insecure: withdraw. If they don’t overtly withdraw, they will probably behave in a way, whether consciously or unconsciously, that will make their love ones withdraw. One way or the other, a man who feels insecure will often force space. If quietness doesn’t work, excessive irritation, agitation, or anger will usually do the job……Generally speaking men withdraw when they feel insecure and women cling. Men give off the don’t mess with me vibe. Women give off the please mess with me vibe. (page 194-195)
Women who struggle with insecurity are particularly taken with two divine attributes: omnipotence and omniscience. (page 208) People who are chronically insecure often have an overwhelming tendency to become control freaks. We feel most secure when our environment is in control and since no one is able to control it to our satisfaction, we decide we have to do it ourselves. If someone would do it and do it right, we wouldn’t have to take over, so it’s not really our fault, we reason. It’s our responsibility. (page 209)
People do what they want to do. You can’t make them do something else. You can’t force them. You can’t change them. You can’t deliver them. Only God can…..When we try to do God’s job, we get in God’s way. (page 214)
We can’t control what we don’t know and we can’t secure what we can’t see. (page 214)
There is knowing. And there is knowing too much. (page 218)
When God initiates, He equips us to handle. Even though unsolicited information might have caused pain and great conflict, if God initiated the revelation, He had a goal in mind that was steeped in great love. Even if He used a messenger you didn’t like, HE worked through His sovereignty to open your eyes to something vital…..When we scratch and claw to dig information out of the dirt, we don’t get the same kind of grace that accompanies divine revelation. (page 219)
We pry because we are insecure and then we are more insecure because we pried. God is the only one who can know a person’s every thought, every motive, every temptation, and every flaw yet still feel good about himself. If we want to become secure women of God, we must cease asking questions we can’t handle the answer to. (page 220-221)
The goal in our female relationships should be to encourage one another’s security. Not enable one another’s insecurity. (page 289)
Any time insecurity hits you can be sure that you are afraid of something…..When we set certain conditions for trust, we offer the enemy of our souls the perfect playground for toying with our minds No, he can’t read our thoughts but he can certainly study our behaviors. Once he pinpoints our emotional Achilles’ heel, he draws back the bow and aims the poisonous dart straight at it. He figures out what we’re most afraid of, and then he taunts us unmercifully with expert marksmanship. (page 324)
So if you’re still reading down to here:
To sum it up, I really got a lot out of this book. The situation this weekend was one where my insecurities were coming at me full force. I’m the type of person that instead of lashing out towards other people when this happens, I beat up on myself even more. The whole section about “wanting to know more because you fear” really spoke to me because that’s exactly what was happening. Had I not read this book right after that happened, I would be a mess right now because I’d be dwelling on the limited information I have and would want to keep trying to find out more. But by doing so it would hurt me and I’d just keep repeating the cycle. Instead, I feel like God gave me tools to learn how to combat it and move toward a more positive way to deal with these.
I’m not perfect nor will I ever be. I know that I have many things to work out and insecurities like these are some of them. But I know that with God, he’ll help me through it all.
The Lord gives strength to his people; the Lord blesses his people with peace. (Psalm 29:11)
There’s something that has been bothering me as of late. It’s not really a huge thing. And I know that I will eventually just get over it and move on.
It’s that nagging feeling of when someone appears to be mad at you or stops liking you and you have no idea why.
Truth: I have trouble trying not to be a people pleaser. I’ve gotten a lot better about it than I used to be in the past. Yes, I worry about what people think still but now I realize that I cannot make people happy all the time.
But it’s one thing when I make decisions because I know what’s best for me and if someone doesn’t like it, oh well. It’s completely another thing when apparently you’ve done something to offend someone and you have absolutely no idea why.
It’s really hard to comprehend the sudden 180 degree change in behavior. When someone goes from treating you like family or like a very close friend and everything that comes with that type of relationship to acting cold and distant and ignoring you whenever you try to talk to them, it can be really hard. And it hurts. A lot.
I spent weeks racking my brain trying to figure out what on earth I could have done wrong and I came up with nothing. Did I say something offensive? Did I do an action that was considered rude? Did I make a promise and forgot to keep it? I even tried to chalk it up to maybe they were having a bad day that one time. I know fully well the world does not revolve around me so perhaps it wasn’t my fault that they reacted differently that one time. Maybe there was something going on in their lives that time that was more important than anything I had to say.
But then it kept happening again and again. To the point where the relationship just completely fizzled out. And I still have no idea what on earth happened.
I did try to find out. I sent texts. Called and left messages. Even mailed cards and letters. All my efforts went unanswered So I gave up.
It felt and still feels horrible. I may never know what happened.
The thing is I know that I’ve done everything I can possibly do. If someone truly has become so angry or disgusted with me but they cannot tell me this, then I know it’s on them and not me. If I knew what offense I have done, then I would apologize. But the thing is, I don’t know what it is or even if there is anything to apologize for. Maybe I did do something horrible and am just completely clueless about it. Maybe there is mistaken assumption and in time it’ll be cleared up. Maybe the relationship just ran out its course and the other party just didn’t feel like publicly ending it and this is the only way they know how.
I just don’t know. But what I do know is that I feel like I’ve done everything that I can do. Even though I feel uneasy about this I’ve tried to react in love and show grace towards them. If space and distance is what they want, then I’ll give them that too, though not in a passive aggressive attitude.
I hope in time I’ll understand what happened and that the relationship can be fixed. If there’s anything I can do to clear things up, I hope God shows me my mistakes and what I can do. If it’s truly not me, then I hope that in time, things will become clear and everything makes sense. I also am prepared that the relationship may never be fixed and I may never know this side of heaven what caused the rift in the first place.
Basically all I can do now is just wait (yay) and just see what happens. I can’t force anything.
I found out this weekend that one of the other bridesmaids didn’t have their ears pierced either. This was basically my reaction:
I wasn’t alone!
Yes it’s a personal choice to not have my ears pierced and I’ve never really wanted to get it done (though I did get my eyebrow pierced back in college which eventually got closed up later on but that’s another story). But it was one of those moments where I didn’t feel like the odd man out anymore.
I walked up to a friend during the reception because he was standing in the corner alone. I was slightly worried that he wanted to be alone and I was intruding. This then became the conversation:
We’re both extroverts so we recharge being around other people. When we’re in our comfort zone with people we know and are close with, we are good to go. We act crazy, are very social, and we’re not afraid to be awkward. But put us in a situation where we only know a few people and it’s a larger crowd, and we shrink. We can’t really go up to people we’ve only met a few times because once you’ve exhausted the same conversation over and over again there’s only so much you can talk about without prompting from the other person. It’s hard to go up to someone you know very well when they are in a conversation with other people because you feel like you’re intruding. Everyone has their own little groups and there’s only so much standing outside of the group nodding that you can do before it gets weird. It’s easier when you are at a table and it’s more confined because you can focus better with the smaller group.
‘I certainly have not the talent which some people possess, of conversing easily with those I have never seen before. I cannot catch their tone of conversation, or appear interested in their concerns, as I often see done.’ – Fitzwilliam Darcy
Instead what you typically end up doing is going off by yourself, most likely with some beverage in your hand, to keep yourself busy while you scope out the crowd and recharge while you make your anxiety calm down a little. You’d like it if someone comes up and strikes up conversation even if it’s someone you don’t know, but when it’s one of your close friends it’s even better when they understand how you felt. So yes, he was thankful that I had come up to him to talk. .
After hearing him say basically everything that always runs through my mind in large social events, my reaction was this
It really makes you feel better when you find out you’re not the only one who feels certain way. When everyone else around you seems like they have it all together and you wonder if something’s wrong with you or if it’s just all in your head, finding someone else who has those same fears and anxieties makes you know you’re not alone and it’s going to be ok. There will always be people who can’t understand you but when you find someone who does, it’s always a win.
“Friendship is born at that moment when one man says to another: “What! You too? I thought that no one but myself . . .”- CS Lewis
A Girl Who Is a Geek 