Silence No More...

Before I started this blog, I had considered creating an anonymous blog where I wrote all of the thoughts that I never share with anyone and publish them under a fake name. Then I realized that's my problem. I don't share how I feel or what I'm thinking with anyone. Why should those things remain anonymous? Why can't I just be proud of my own thoughts? After all, they are my own, right? I should be proud of myself even the crazy stuff that goes on in my brain.

I am terrible at expressing myself verbally. When people ask me questions about myself, I never know how to respond. I cannot answer the most simple questions without being extremely vague. Lately, I've been especially shy but I'm really trying to get myself back to the point I was about a year ago when I was quite good at interacting with people and looking them in the eye. Now, I hold my head down, sit off to the side, while I watch everyone else get involved. I want to be involved too.

Today in one of my classes, we had to introduce ourselves and say what our favorite movie was. I said Amelie and my teacher said "A lot of students have told me to watch it, what's it about?" I couldn't even describe it. My blind went blank and I couldn't even remember what happened in the movie. I only got as far as saying "It's about a girl who grew up kind of shut off from the rest of the world and grows up really shy and awkward and then she decides to help people..." Then my brain died on me and I said "I'm sorry. I don't know how else to describe it." My teacher was like "Well then, your assignment this semester is to learn how to describe the plot of a movie." Then he walked away from me. I felt so stupid that I wanted to cry. Then I felt the tremendous need to make up for my stupidity. Later in the class, he asked for someone to tell him what we would be doing in our humanities class. Nobody else raised their hand, so I did. Luckily I got the answer right and he elaborated on what I said. 

I'm sure he didn't care that I didn't know how to explain the plot and I'm sure I took it more to heart than anyone in the class. I think he's a cool guy, but I think I just need to get more comfortable with him and my classmates before I'll feel more at ease speaking in class. I hate answering questions on the spot because I have to work through my answer in my head before I say it or it's going to come out very disorganized and awkward. This is why I'm so shy. I know I'm not good at talking to people and I'm so afraid that I look stupid that I end up looking even more awkward.

I'm going to force myself to talk to more people though. I'm going to work on talking to people in my classes and getting to know them. My fear of talking to people isn't going to go away until I push myself to do it more. I'm tired of being on the sidelines. I want to be involved and make the most of my education and my life.