I Am Too Reserved

I just had an epiphany. It’s pretty obvious… but I am too reserved. I’m too scared of looking weird, awkward, annoying, raw, sexy…. ANYTHING. So I hold back. I hold back ALL of me without even knowing it. I want to look strong and badass, or professional and polite, so I put forth whichever one is appropriate at the time, but everything else is withheld and its existence is denied.

I was talking with my friend about a commercial where someone is singing in the car, really going at it. Then they pull up to a stoplight and make eye contact with people in the car next to them. He stops and looks away, trying to play it off all cool. When they drive off, he starts rocking out again. If you know what commercial I’m talking about, no worries, I’ll get to all of THAT in another post ;)

I thought it was hilarious, because doesn’t that happen to everyone? You’ll be belting along with the radio and then stop when you pull up to another car… But my friend said that’s insecurity. And I’m like, eh, kind of… not really. It’s not a real “insecurity”. It’s not the same. That’s a weird thing to call insecurity.

But the more I let that sink in throughout the day, the more I realize how right my friend was.

I think in my mind I went directly to the next extreme (which is how I feel he is sometimes) – being completely obnoxious and not caring how it affects anyone around you. That, to me, is the alternative to this “insecurity” of things like rocking out to songs on the radio and not caring who sees or hears you. And I don’t think that’s right. But it doesn’t have to be the opposite extreme. He’s right – you stop because you don’t want to be judged. You don’t want people to think you are weird. That, deep down, IS insecurity.

Interesting.

So later I hear this song in a commercial, and I look it up. It’s this girl with a YouTube channel who does cover songs (YouTube channel: ItsMashaBitch). She is EXCELLENT! She has that raw, raspy rock voice and is full of emotion. Her videos show her actually recording the songs. She gets SO into it. She clearly doesn’t care about looking awkward, and you can TELL. You can TELL because she has so much CONFIDENCE and throws herself at the song with such ABANDON that it is actually really beautiful… even though I know I’d look completely ridiculous if I were to do the same thing.

And then it all started flooding to me. She has confidence in that area where my friend and I were talking about insecurity. She can get into every emotion. She EMBODIES it. I can’t even do that. I can’t put that much emotion into it. That’s been apparent in my dance classes, too. I was getting a little better, but I’ve always just been so RESERVED. And I know why. It’s because no one ever cared. When I DID express my emotions, I got dismissed, ridiculed, ignored or yelled at. So I learned to just shut up and be quietly sad. Anger, sure, I can do that one. But nothing involving any of those “bad” emotions, like desire, yearning, despair, joy… I don’t even know how to describe it. But now I know. I need to figure out how to express what’s within – express it without feeling awkward. It’s GOING to be awkward at first, because I’ve repressed all those emotions. But I need to figure out how to let everything within me OUT, and ACCEPT it, and LOVE it. Things that I don’t even know are THERE right now.

I guess mimicking this Masha girl isn’t the answer, but maybe it’s a start? If I can attempt to throw myself at music with the abandon that she has, maybe it’ll open a door into how I express myself. Maybe it will invite that side of me to come out and play.

Really interesting stuff. Really fascinating. I knew I had issues, but damn. I didn’t realize I had quite so many. I’m glad I’m working through them…