You only have the courage that should rightfully be yours
when you have nothing to lose.
This says a lot about us as human beings. It says a lot
about the power of fear, and the pain of hope. I think it’s sobering. After all, we
shouldn’t let fear rule our lives, right?
Let me tell you a story that illustrates my point. There was
this girl. From the moment I saw her I was taken aback. I immediately knew I
wanted to know her better, I wanted to be a part of her life. And I wanted her
to be a part of mine. It’s crazy, yeah – I mean, love at first sight is just a
fantasy, right? A daydream? Maybe it is. But that’s the way I felt about her,
right or wrong.
The trouble, though, was that whenever she was near me, I
totally lost my cool. I mean, I’m not a confident person by any stretch of the
imagination, and I lack the natural facility in social situations that many
people have. But what limited social skills I do possess abandoned me
ruthlessly every time she walked in the room. I laughed in a ridiculously giddy
manner at everything she said; I smiled twice as much as any sane person ever
should. In short, I wasn’t myself anymore. I was this different person.
Why the transformation? Sadly, I think it’s because I was
hoping she wouldn’t see me, but rather someone better than me. I hoped I could
make her think I was cooler, more fun, interesting, nice and impressive than I really was. I was trying to hoodwink her because I was terrified
she wouldn’t like the real me, that she wouldn’t return my sentiments for her.
We’ve all been down that road – liking someone more than
they like us. It sucks. And I couldn’t bear to think through what that might be
like if it happened this time - but it’s happened to me before, so I had a pretty good idea. I suppressed the
thought vigorously, but it came leaking through anyway, turning my hope into
agony and further eroding my self-confidence – which in turn made the
transformation into my exaggerated self whenever she was around all the more
extreme.
Long story short: we went out a few times; I got my hopes
up; I asked her to be my girlfriend; and she turned me down. Sad. But hardly remarkable or noteworthy. This kind of stuff happens every day all over the
planet. Get over it, right? That’s what I did. Or, at least, I got over her as
much and as fast as my heart would allow me to. I studiously avoided the “woe
is me, I’m gonna slit my wrists now” mentality. I moved on.
I avoided her as much as possible. Because, try as I might,
I never failed to notice her the instant she walked into the room,
and I couldn’t think straight as long as she was there. I’ve decided that love
is like sediment and your heart is like a glass of water. Once you fall in love
with someone like that, the sediment is always there. As long as you don’t stir
it up, though, it will settle at the bottom and you won’t notice it’s there. So
I avoid past crushes as studiously as possible to keep things inert, like some
stratified, love-sick geology.
But one day, I just couldn’t. I was somewhere I wanted to
be, with people I wanted to be with, and poof, in she walks. Dang! This was
several weeks after it was over and almost as long since I had seen her last. I
decided it was time to stop avoiding her and just go say hello. So I did.
And guess what? I didn’t transform. Nothing. I was cool,
collected, my head on my shoulders and my feet on the ground. I didn’t giggle
or laugh (more than I normally do, anyway ;) and I carried on a rather lengthy
conversation (compared to what I had intended) as if she was just any ordinary
person. You know what else? I didn’t have any hope whatsoever that this would
lead to anything else. I wanted to say hi, and that’s all. I knew I would say a few short words, that she would give me a few seconds of her
attention, and then I would depart and I wouldn’t be on her mind for a second
longer.
My twin lack of hope and transformation were linked. Because I had zero hope, (and therefore
zero fear) I was able to be myself. And the funny thing is she was the one
keeping the conversation going, not me. And she suggested we go see a movie we
had wanted to see together, not me. And she gave me a wonderful, long, sincere
hug when I said goodbye. I hadn’t planned on any physical contact at all. The
irony of this all struck me like a meteor on my way home. I felt like it was
condensing on my clothes, it was so thick.
What a shame! Are we so consumed by self-doubt and so afraid
that our dreams won’t come true that we can’t be ourselves? Are we truly afraid
to be ourselves? I know I was when she was around. I didn’t want to be me – I
wanted to be someone else, someone better
than me. I knew (or feared) instinctively that I wasn’t enough, I wasn’t good
enough to make her like me.
The sad truth is we should be brave enough to be ourselves –
to own ourselves - faults, weaknesses, foibles and all. And we should be strong
enough to admit that not everyone is going to like us, we aren’t going to
be the most popular, loved and admired person on the planet.
I think, deep down, we need to love ourselves for who we
are. And yeah, that’s hard, because no one’s perfect, and so loving ourselves
means coming to terms with the parts of us that aren’t admirable, that aren’t
beautiful, and that might need some work to change. But there’s no use
pretending to be more than we really are in the mean time, or wishing that others won’t notice
the bad along with the good. God loves us the way we are, and encourages us to
become better, more, greater. He doesn’t want us to doubt ourselves, to hate
ourselves.
But how do you possibly overcome the fear that your dreams
won’t come true when most of the time they don’t? I’m not sure on this one.
Perhaps all I can offer is this: when you want something good, and you give all
you can give and do all you can do within your power to get it (and by this I
mean when you are truly yourself, the best you can be), then that’s all. The
rest isn’t up to you, and there’s nothing you can do about it. If it doesn’t
turn out, then that hurts, and I’m sorry. But isn’t that the way life is? Being
yourself is really all you can do.
