Despicable Me

I just read an article about being vulnerable and showing people who you are, and how it can enrich your life.

HA! I laughed at that! I just read it and thought, yep. I know all of this.

Because I had to make a decision years ago about how I was gonna live my life.

When things stress me out, I get rid of them. When I was a little seventh grader I realized "image" stressed me out. And so I made a conscious decision to be O.K. with who I was. And it wasn't something that changed overnight. It took a while. It took determination, branching out, consciously dealing with embarrassment, and a lot of pretending not to care.

The more I put myself out there, landed myself in awkward situations, and swam around in the aftermath, the more comfortable I became in my own pale-white skin. It was a mental exertion, I had to purposely think to myself, yes. My face is getting red right now. Don't run away. Don't be embarrassed about being embarrassed. It's OK. It's funny. Smile.

And then, after months and years and YEARS of practice, I finally found myself really just content. I had finally whittled away all of the pretension that naturally cakes our personalities. It was a raw me, one that everyone could see, and everyone could see right through me. And I was OK with that, so long as I knew my motives were right. I felt, that as long as I knew everything I did was good and right and true to my own personality, I would never have anything to hide from anyone.

Right?

Well, now I am who I am. I know there are people who think I am full of myself. That's OK, because I probably seem that way to them. And who am I to disagree with their perception on the world? And what would I say? "No, I totes am not stuck up, you're stuck up, you big, stuck up idiot!!"
Haha, I think that sometimes people confuse confidence with pride. And I know I am not proud, I am very aware of my faults, the confidence comes from being able to let people see those faults. That's not pride, that's honesty. I can be confident in my faults because I am wanting to improve on them. We run into trouble when we try to justify. Mostly I've had to work on saying "Yes, OK." Instead of, "Yeah I know but..." No justification. Just accept it, let the statement lie as it may, and then work on it. Boom! Easiest recipe to make yourself eat some humble pie. It doesn't always taste the best, but lemme tell you, it's so worth it in the end. It helps to build your confidence muscles. It tones your mental body. It's great.

Cool thing is, is that you never stop working on it. Always there is more to be comfortable with, there is more to fix about yourself. It's a refining process, and the end results, I hear, are perfect.