Past vs. Present-Self: The Struggle to Overcome Insecurities

I'm not really sure I want to write this. I’ve gone from gaining more confidence at times, to finding myself lacking confidence at all. I plan dates, chat online, and am meeting new females, while other times I am at home alone curled up on my couch because it is just emotionally difficult and confusing. I want to open myself up, but the process of finding someone to open myself up to means risking myself and facing rejection, as well as rejecting others.

People who date are brave. I am brave.

But I don’t feel brave.

I don’t know how else to say it, putting yourself out there emotionally is very vulnerable. You are basically putting yourself before another person and seeing if you find enough value in the other to pursue a relationship. In the past, when you are single and under 25, this isn’t as complicated because it can be done by meeting females through friends or through other female friends. However, once you get out of college or graduate school, you have to be more intentional about dating. You cannot "wait" for friendship to see if you like someone or wait for some person to fall into your lap. The truth is, male or female, you have to put yourself out there and also pursue. You gain nothing without taking action, without taking risks. The risk may come out well, but there may also be a long road of confusion and some sticky emotional feelings that arise. You have to be sure about your foundation in life; your family, your friends, and your faith if you are a religious person. Simply put, you cannot put all of your identity into dating, in what these others people think of you, as the people you are pursuing should not hold you up on some pedestal as well.

This past week I was getting tired of waiting. I’ve wanted to pursue some females at work for a while now. Well, one day this week she one working and I passed by one of them and said hi. I work at a hospital and the (damn) floors are always busy and so is the staff, including myself. I thought about the idea for a while now of writing her a letter and putting it in her box but know in-person is always the best choice to ask someone out. This week I just got frustrated with myself and the situation.

I often lack confidence and wait.

Other times I just want to get it over with.

Is there a happy medium?
Patience.

My anxiety rose that day and I got nervous. I also got a call and had no reason to go back to that area of the hospital that day, unless of course I just began wondering around the halls aimlessly, looking like I am lost when my badge shows I clearly work at this place every day. I wrote to a few friends online to get suggestions, cause I was tired of waiting and thought maybe the letter was a good idea. It wasn’t. It isn’t. It will never be. I know that.

Honestly, I only ever asked one female out on an actual date in person. She did say yes; however, I think by the time I asked her I was well acquainted with the friend-zone and she clearly did not see me in a romantic manner. Despite things not working out there, I’ve found myself through the years asking females out, typically through Facebook if I know them in-person. Only recently, as you readers know, have I pursued online dating. It has given me more confidence, but to say I still don’t have my issues would be incorrect.

What I haven’t shared is that I’ve been chatting with at least three females the last couple of weeks. I even went on a date to the zoo, which was good; however, I did not feel a spark with this female. I felt as if I was asking questions, telling stories, and trying to be engaging and she simply wasn’t responding back. Sometimes it was like talking to a wall. I’ve noticed this with some females I have had coffee with, like they stick to the basics, so while I want to know their personality and hear stories about their life, they seem to mostly want to give and receive facts. If dating is only about facts, I could send you a resume. And well, you DID see my online profile. But that profile is not me. It is an image or portrayal of me. I am a whole and complicated person.

In addition to this, despite losing a lot of weight, I still mentally and emotionally see myself as a fat person. That is just the truth. I can look at my pictures and in the mirror and in my mind know logically I’ve lost weight and am more attractive; however, emotionally I mostly feel the opposite. When I think about asking someone out, I feel like they will reject me because I am a fat loser with no confidence. The irony is I know I am not a loser, know I am not fat, and know by asking I am actually expressing confidence, so long as I'm not mumbling like an idiot. I think it is taking time for my newer image of myself to throw out the older image, writing a new update over the old software that ran my mind and life for so long. I am still that person on the inside, but the dark doubts and ways I felt about myself must change, need to change, simply HAVE to change. They fit me and my life no longer.

Pressing forward is not easy,

but the alternative is that the old ideal of myself will remain,

but it cannot and the new self I am making must rise.

~ Single Me

Ticketed in the Church: Writing While Single?

Anytime a person writes about their life, they have to choose what areas of their life they wish to write about and the areas they wish to keep personal. I actually started writing about being single back in 2007, mid-way through my time in seminary. I came to a point in my life, after twenty-five, when I began to acknowledge that I may be single for far longer than I had anticipated.

For years I wrote about my life, but neglected writing about my thoughts and experiences being single. Mostly, I didn’t want to come across whiny, needy, or desperate (Ironically, just writing that makes me come across whiny, needy, and desperate). So, in 2007 for a brief stint, I wrote about being single on my main blog and on my Facebook; however, during that time I learned that my more personal experiences, thoughts, and insecurities regarding singleness did not need to be on my main blog.

If writing is about choosing your boundaries, how much you will open up, I learned that writing about being single needed to only be available to those who could take the hard truths I was seeing and living; therefore, back in 2011, I moved all my blogs entries about being single from my main blog to a separate and anonymous site.

Why anonymous? Basically, when you work as a minister, you are open to public scrutiny, so while I have the desire to write and share, I don’t desire for bosses, coworkers, patients, and their families into that part of my life. And honestly, I also did it also to cut down on hearing cliché phrases and responses from those who are married, trying to console my dark times by telling me I will find someone in time, I should focus on myself, or how they long for the days of their own freedom and singleness.

So, while this vast area of my life has been stricken from my public writing, it does still exist, it exists because I use writing as a way to process life and hope others will join me in their journey as well, that life isn’t all the happy pictures and status updates we post and see, but is sometimes tough and gritty and uncomfortable.

I want to make (you) my readers uncomfortable because I am not always comfortable. I see a lot of areas of life to ponder, and while none of them are off limits necessarily, some areas deserve more privacy and care. That being said, being single is just one area of my life and if a married person believes a single person is to be pitied or avoided for their singular status, I’d say that person is forgetting that the cornerstones of any relationship is built on love, friendship, and trust.

In fact, Jesus had a lot to say about friendship,

Which will be the focus of my next blog entry.

But for today, let's take a second to think about the unneeded divisions we place between people, not just married and single, but male and female, rich and poor, and so forth. Then remember that, for those of us who call ourselves Christian… In Christ, We are (Supposed to Be) One.

¹² Just as a body, though one, has many parts, but all its many parts form one body, so it is with Christ. ¹³ For we were all baptized by one Spirit so as to form one body—whether Jews or Gentiles, slave or free—and we were all given the one Spirit to drink. ¹⁴ Even so the body is not made up of one part but of many. – 1^st Corinthians 12:12-14

~ Doubledb

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