It was suggested over on Twitter that I write about
Self-Doubt. I don't know about you but for me - talk about the Mother Lobe, the
thing that many things flow.
I have self doubt in:
Searching for a job.
Dating (I wouldn't call what I do, dating. Don't have a clue
how to put myself out there.)
And in writing.
I mean I suffered from self-doubt since I was nine years old
in third grade. You know the year that girls start whispering, also the year I
noticed that this hearing loss made me different. Something I never felt with
my family, but at school that year I noticed it. It started when the other
girls around me whispered. It grew to the overwhelm self hate and self doubt
that I wasn't good enough.
I remember telling my mother that no one in my class liked
me. She, of course, went to my teacher. I remember the confuse look on my
teacher's face, because it wasn't true. I built it up in my mind from my own
self dislike. I mean if you're talking to a group of girls on the playground and
all at once they run away because in a spit second they decided to go play elsewhere
and you didn't hear the one sentence that decided that. What would you think?
By the way this is also the year I realized that my spelling
and reading skills were not at the level of my classmates.
I spent two hours in the class for the hard of hearing working
on those skills. This also told me I was different. But that classroom was a
safe place. I wasn't different from the teenagers in that class that were also
hard of hearing. I was the youngest in the class.
I think that the year my shyness grew to point that it was
painful for me to come out of my shell to talk to anyone.
See lots of self doubt.
I didn't know about introverts and extroverts. I also didn't
realize that the first time I meet someone I need to "learn" how they
sound, how they talk and their body language .
I know this now so I'm quiet the first time I meet someone in
a group, or since I've gotten older I learned how to get people talking so I
don't have to.
Over the years I searched for the thing called self
confidence. I even went to an all girls' college because on the campus tour I
heard that girls who went to all girls' school had more confidence. It shocked
everyone that I chose to go to an out of town college. I was that shy.
I found self confidence for a little while. Well, enough to
somewhat come out of my shell. It still not easy, when it come to talking to
men for one thing. Like I said I have no clue how to put myself out there.
When it come to flirting I'm clueless. I don't how to flirt.
Also if I picked up the body language that a guy's interested in me. I either
tell myself that I'm wrong and the guy's being nice or I freeze. I have ran
before. Like ran away from the whole soccer team at the university I attended. Yup... there is a story there, sure is.
Also I don't have a clue how to made the internet dating work
for me either.
I have a problem of
thinking I'm not good enough to be loved, not in that way. I have a strange way
of thinking that another girl would be better for this guy. I don't give myself
much of a chance.
The same thing would be said for searching for a job. I don't
have much confidence that I can do the job well. I haven't even got the job and
I'm worried I'm not good enough. I didn't do my last job very well. I didn't
have a clue, and the women who worked with me were so worried I'd take their
job that they didn't help me.
I didn't want their job. When I started that job I was
looking into going back to school and I thought about being a minister. Yes, a
female minister. I was looking into going to seminary school. By the time I got
laid off from that job ten months later I was so full of self-doubt I could
feel it clawing at my back. I was no longer looking into going seminary school.
A few things happened in my family that it turned out not
having a job meant I could help my family. It was a relief to do something good
for my family.
But I was in a place where I thought I was bad a picking what
I should do. Stuck in life. (still there)
To escape the self doubt I wrote novels.
But I had self-doubt there. About my writing. I mean I would
think who I'm I kidding and write anyway. I wrote because I need to write. I
needed to escape.
By the way I wrote about my doubts with my writing in a short
series:
I have doubts about sharing this post with you.
I'm still searching for self-confidence.
I hope this help you realize you're not alone.
You are good enough 🖤
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