Sometimes,
I’m not sure what to make of my mother. Sometimes, she sends
rather conflicting messages, though she doesn’t so much
contradict herself as she wants to clarify that she doesn’t
want to lead me anywhere against my will. And yet, at the same time,
I feel as though she is
leading me to directions I don’t want to go.
Well, to be fair, that’s a slight exaggeration. I do understand that she’s only trying to help me. I understand that she’s only leading me back to crossroads I previously overlooked. But for some reason, I keep refusing to turn back.
Maybe I should turn back this time. Maybe I should get some actual help to overcome my shyness for once. In fact, I’ve already been contemplating that possibility, even before she asked me if I wanted to seek help today. In all honesty, though, I’m in two minds about it. On the one hand, it would help me with my almost non-existent confidence, and I’d have better chances of passing the entrance exams for the pedagogical studies next year.
On the other hand, I somehow feel that my true image would get destroyed in the process. I feel that a more confident me would be conveying a false image of myself. While the benefits of that far outweigh the drawbacks, chances are I’d feel like I weren’t myself.
The question is, however: if I were to seek help and overcome my shyness, would the confident me become the real me?
I don’t like pretending. I have a deep loathing for people who pretend to be something they’re not. If I pretended to be something else, I’d hate myself. Never once have I shown a false version of myself to anyone. I’ve always been genuine - always shown myself as me.
Shyness is in my nature. I never approach anyone, and when I try, I refrain from actually doing it. I’m rarely the first person to open their mouth. I rarely trick myself into initiating conversation, but in all fairness, I’m too self-conscious to trick myself anyway.
So then, would the shy me become the false me? Would I be confident by nature if I overcame my shyness? It’s possible, but even in that case, I wouldn’t want the shy me to die. At the end of the day, the shy me is the true me. If anything, I’d only want to bring out the confidence hidden inside me, not have it replace my shyness. As shy as I am, and as much as I occasionally hate it, it’s kept me safe from a lot of bullshit.