To the one who's afraid to be the main character of your own life

Where is the line between dreaming and feeling blue? It's four o'clock in the evening, I haven't left my room. I think that when you're a chronic deep thinker, it's really easy to feel disconnected from people pretty consistently. And it's so easy to internalize that feeling and that expectation without even realizing it. It's like the expectation of not fitting in just slowly creeps into your perception of yourself and other people so much so that you just anticipate it. And you sort of end up choosing to do your own thing again and again and again until it feels normal because that's where you sort of feel like you're most yourself. Being invisible or existing in the background creates a sense of freedom, in a way. Well, that is until it doesn't. And an enemy can become a very comfortable prison. So I've been trying to be more honest with myself with how much I live self-imposed in the margins of my own life. Or maybe even what people would consider to be a vibrant life, you know? I mean, I've become so used to doing my own thing that it feels just fine. It feels like living and fulfilling. And then when I look at other people's lives, I'm like, you know, maybe I am missing a few things. I mean, what's the line between just being an introvert and using that as an excuse to stay in my comfort zone? This is a tough one because I mean, as creative and contemplative people, we for sure need time alone. And I'm definitely not looking to erase that in myself or in anybody else because frankly, the world could probably use a little bit more contemplation. But here's the thing. This whole channel is about my artist journey and kind of bringing whoever wants to come along with me on that journey. And just talking about stuff I find along the way and wisdom and things that I want to live out and have be true for my life. Except to be honest, I am probably not super great at always taking my own advice. I think a lot of this kind of shows up in ordinary life, like me preferring to stay home and paint or read or finish the show that I'm really into at the moment instead of trying a new hobby or a sport or going to some social event that I might not be super familiar with. Or just like making friends for the heck of making new friends. Like, I just don't really think to do those things naturally at this point because it's so uncomfortable. And now that I really think of it, I think part of that is because I feel like in order to be around people, I need to offer them more than what they give me. Which not only doesn't make sense, it's a lot of unnecessary responsibility. So it's just been easier, even subconsciously easier, to stay inside my own head and build palaces in the sky instead of trying to get a new person to understand me. I mean, you can't really be rejected for the person you've never met, right? Somehow, without me fully noticing, I've gotten comfortable living in Rapunzel's tower. And like the Lady of Shalott, I find myself sometimes looking at the world through a mirror instead of forcing myself to look directly at it. See, here's the thing about me and my personality is that I love ideas. I love relentlessly digging into something that I can't understand but know that if I try hard enough, I can. I love unraveling mysteries and just getting clarity on things, you know? But that's all head work. And it's not really, like, life work, but it can feel a lot like living life. And it's honestly addictingly satisfying to figure something out, to learn stuff. But more and more, I kind of feel like my intellectual curiosity has become a really good proxy for living life. Because thinking sure does feel a lot like actually living. And I'm not gonna change myself into an extrovert. That would just not be respecting who I am and I'd be downright miserable. Besides, living life too fast is just as much of a prison as living it too slowly. The thing is, is that it's painful to not be accepted. And my mind works a little bit differently. I mean, I'm creative. That's like the definition of creativity. And I know I'm not the only one who feels that way. So it's like when we as creative people put something out there that, like, we can see the connections on, but other people don't always, it can feel so alienating. And that's painful. And that pain has kind of created this fear. This fear that started small at first, but I think snowballed over years and years of this. And it's where I hesitate to make conversations with random strangers and smile at them and want to, I don't know, just put myself out there on the regular because I just assume that they'll think I'm odd. It kind of results in me just not really speaking my mind, having opinions and keeping them on the inside. All this is pretty sad because I deeply love people. I mean, that is why I am in the arts. It's a people-oriented field. The arts are there to connect you, and yet I avoid people a lot. And I guess my point of self-reflection here is that maybe I have been living my life just a little too slowly. And maybe in my younger years I needed to. I needed to retreat, to heal, to recalibrate, to understand myself. But now I've outgrown that, and I need to be honest here. I need to take what I've learned and actually live a little. All this struggle is because my soft, too impressionable little soul learned somewhere along the way that if and when others see me that I'm not really likable or understood by most people, that I'm a little bit odd, that I overthink, overfeel, that I'm awkward. But it's not like I don't have so many people who do know me and love me. So why do I internalize all these bad experiences? Why is that what we as humans tend to do instead of the positive ones? And when did my mind become such a distorted funhouse mirror? Like, I don't know. I just feel like I'm kind of a conundrum sometimes. Like, I'm an assertive person's soul trapped in, like, a passive person's body. And I don't know. I've always been this, like, strange mix of just different contrasting traits. I'm a debater, an independent thinker to my core. I was born a leader deep in my heart. But I hate making mistakes. I hate putting myself in places where I can fail. I hate disappointing people. And I hate, even more, letting them down and hurting them. But when did I start believing that it's better to withhold what I have to offer than offering it imperfectly? Maybe allowing yourself to be seen feels a little overwhelming. At least I know it does for me sometimes. But it doesn't have to be all at once. Frankly, it starts with really simple stuff like smiling more, making more eye contact, and that internal truth that you and I are worth being acknowledged, quiet or not. And I think we just need to practice being present in the presence of others.