I think for a lot of us we really get in our own way. We over think the way that we believe others feel about us, whether true or false, but typically in the negative. Seldom do we think about a relationship of ours & think “wow, so & so probably enjoys my company,” “x,y,z, must get value in our companionship if they keep inviting me around” & of course we don’t because even just reading those, it sounds psychotic! That’s not how our brains work, that’s not how we’re all wired & I get it! I understand why. As a member of the kingdom ‘Animalia’ we are hard wired to be looking for the things that are '“wrong” in any given situation. We are programed to be constantly reevaluating the patterns of life around us in search of a change that would indicate danger. (Especially if you’re nuerospicy.) It’s a survival tactic. Even amongst our peers & our loved ones there is a part of us that must always keep up our defenses in the off chance that we have to engage in fight or flight or that our behavior finds us ostracized from our social groups.
I feel like most animals are pretty adepts at reading the body language of their fellow like species. Dogs & cats pick up on aggression cues from one another down to the smallest twitch of the ears or the positioning of the body & we humans are no different. A large number of us are so adept at picking up the interpersonal cues we share that we almost become fortunetellers, putting the pattern recognized cart before the proverbial horse. Sometimes, especially when growing up, certain situations can devolve human behavior & pattern recognition into trauma responses, often from dealing with a neglectful, narcissistic, aloof, abusive, insert your desired adjective here*, care giver. Sometimes those trauma responses come from being outcast by our peers in school or amongst age similar social groups & when left untreated all of these sheltering attributes follow us into adulthood.
Now, I’m not here to give you a sociology lesson or a psychological one. All of this pretense is simply in the way to set up something that I myself have been working through. Maybe it’s the fully developed frontal lobe that finally decided it wants to show up to work or maybe it’s personal growth. Whatever it is, I’ve found myself lately saying “why not” more & more.
If that felt like a hard left turn to a few of you reading this, I promise, the thread will come back around & we’ll tie all of this in a nice little ribbon. I am someone who has always been fairly self conscious. For a lot of you that may come off as surprising given my profession & that I get on here most weeks & spew my thoughts to the world wide web so that they may be read the world wide. But it’s true. I am fairly self conscious. I was never a classic cool kid, until high school I really only had a hand full of friends & I always felt like the black sheep of the suburban lower Midwestern world that I grew up in where people, especially in school, were never slow to voice their opinions of you. I was always taller than everyone in my class, always the weird one, all ways the one who got called ‘gay’ or ‘strange’ & those are badges of honor that take a long time to own, if you ever do. But more & more I’ve abandoned the preconceived societal norms & simply embraced life for what it is.
I think the most recent example of this came from my show the other night. It was the first time in a long time that I had done a full band set & following le pandemmy, I actually redeveloped a bit of stage fright that typically takes me the first song or two to work through. So as the act before me was finishing up, I was off to the side having a bit of a panic at which point I stopped & said to myself “why not just have fun? This is what you love doing, performing, singing, making music, entertaining people, why not just do it for the joy of doing it? If you mess up, you mess up as is human to do & you carry on. No one is here to watch you fail, everyone would rather see the best show you’re filling to give than watch you stumble timidly through a set.” & so that is what I did. I got on stage & I had fun.
Not only did I have fun, but in actually I had a blast & it may have been one of the favorite sets that I’ve done in recent memory. Me having fun allowed the band to have fun which allowed the audience to have fun & following the set I had more people percentage wise come up to me to say how much they loved my music & my energy than I have ever had before.
Another example. I’m someone who has always found themselves reserved with my emotions or the way that I feel, especially when it comes to those I am partnered with. I find myself holding back often & lately I’ve been answering that restraint with “why not?” Why not let your feelings be apparent? Who does it benefit if you hold them back? If anything all it does is create this ere of distance because there is actually self inserted space between you.
I put on music the other night, I thought why not dance? So that’s what I did. Unreserved, unrestricted, I danced freely & had a ball doing so! Why not be honest about what you want to eat when people ask where you want to get dinner? The worst they can do is disagree & then at least you’ve made the attempt & won’t spend the rest of the evening wishing you’d said something, wondering if the evening could have ended up where you wanted to go instead. I’m not saying to be uncompromising here, just telling you to be honest.
Too much of what could be life’s shimmering moments go by behind lock & key. Too many of them pass with fear & hesitation instead of with vigor & joy. If people judge you for doing the things you want, for being the person you want to be, that’s their burden to bare, not yours. Your open expression of joy is often met with the limitations of someone else’s self sabotaging prohibition. Your life is yours to live & feel & embrace, not theirs.
I hope you all have a fabulous ‘whatever point in time you end up reading this’ & will lean into those ‘why nots’ a little more. Have fun, be a shining example of freedom & joy & unapologetic expression because that’s what you deserve. Start small, work your way up! You’ve got this!
As always, much much much love to you all!!!
-C