WARNING: This post may contain mild profanity. Reader discretion is advised (if you happen to be a complete pussy).
So… I tend to naturally be pretty meek. Empathy, caring, and general shyness (perhaps combined with a tall, extremely controlling sibling… and yeah, some of that “moral upbringing” stuff) creates a need to fulfill the needs of others–any others–before my own. People (primarily various self-defense instructors) have been yelling at me about this over the past couple years because, well, it’s kind of a stupid way to live in the long run–particularly from a self-defense point of view. So I’ve been trying to change it over the past couple years.
Frankly, it’s a lot harder to act confident and strong than shy and unable to even look at people’s faces while walking (interestingly enough, if you look at their faces, you’ll find that there are many more memorizing the details of their shoes than anything else). But I’ve been doing it because it’s safer than having a vulnerable appearance. There’s also the whole theory of “the way you act is the way you feel,” which, while not complete BS, really doesn’t work that great. If you’re pissed off and try to pretend you’re having the time of your life, you’re only going to get more pissed off. And if you try to act bold and unafraid to stare at people in the eye, you’ll only start feeling odd and worried that you’ve somehow done them an insult by overpowering them… or just wonder why that person was staring at you, which is only obvious from a third-person perspective. So it becomes even more difficult to keep your eyes up because you know that some people are going to stare back at you and create that awkward sort of moment.
But I did it anyways, even after a day like today when I’m out of my dorm for 10 hours (after four hours of sleep, possibly due to a Cherry Coke at 2pm, my stupid, loud suitemates being loud and stupid, and (probably the most likely reason) being rather upset about something). I get damn tired on these days, and the last thing I feel like doing is walk the whole way across campus practically staring down complete strangers. It’s a (frankly, surprisingly) difficult thing to do, having to act like you have confidence, but it’s (frankly, also kind of surprisingly) safer than the alternative.
But I’m not sure I’m having to pretend anymore. Perhaps it’s the formation of friendships, perhaps just the natural course of life, perhaps this acting crap is working and I haven’t noticed, or perhaps it’s this random story I’m about to tell. See, I went to the local gun show a couple weeks ago and bought my first piece of movie memorabilia: a super-awesome Indiana Jones knife:

Yeah… that’s 18″ of steel right there, full tang and all–incredibly well-made. I love it to death. So my dad took it and “sharpened” it with one of these pieces of crap to cut a tree bush branch. Now, I love my dad to death, and it’s usually kind of neat when he does stupid stuff like that (last weekend, burning branches in the front yard - me: is that gas? Dad: No [pause] it’s diesel fuel *pours it on the fire*), but this was my knife and “nerdchandise”, and he took it from me while I was there and made the edge so jagged that the thing’s practically a saw (alright, a slight exaggeration (the above picture was taken after this event), but it’s definitely noticeable if you look close enough (with a blind eye, mind you) and it can certainly be felt.
The thing is, I was there and only whined. I don’t want to do that any more, so I won’t.
…but then again, I did have the audacity to somewhat question my rather intimidating shooting instructor the week before that (and, well, it was more of a request for information than a challenge), and had been actually talking and expressing opinions in my Ancient Philosophy class (why are all the interesting subjects for me 2 words… and the initials AP?), so perhaps it was just a simple change in thought that was taking place anyways–for whatever reason. On the other hand, it may have needed something to push it over the edge.
…and therein lies the problem with absolutely any Psychological research. Too many damn variables.
So, boldness is a difficult thing to achieve, particularly for someone who, say, less than six months ago had social anxiety to the extent of trembling in social situations (…and for the longest time, I thought it was just cold. It actually took me a while to take into account the actual temperature). Apparently, it’s possible coming with just age, wisdom, and people yelling at you, but I’m sure something making you very angry that you could’ve stopped probably helps.
Well, let’s minorly switch topics here, since, as all readers should know, the length of a normal post is just far too little for me. Males, along with all of mankind, have been shaped into total wimps by today’s society. Or… at least, that’s what this culture tries to do, thus creating a generation of men who aren’t allowed to be manly (and, come to think of it, women in the mindset that housewivery is practically a crime). It’s taught that women should have more power–not because it’s kind of stupid to act vulnerable, but because they’re supposed to deserve it from what happened in the past.
I know what you’re thinking. “Hazel, you already wrote about that last semester, and you link back to it every. Other. Post. We know what you think of feminism, give it a rest already!” Now, hear me out here. I’m not blaming women for modern society’s problems… alright, so I got a little off track in the last paragraph, let me retract and try again with mankind as the primary focus (because, frankly, I doubt I’m inside men’s heads enough to speak for a gender of which I am most assuredly not a part), because women are also not taught to be bold.
I mean sure, the public schools spout crap about gaining self-esteem and “you can do anything if you put your mind to it!” and maybe the occasional mention of leadership (I never really fully got that, actually… but let’s explore it in a later post), but it somehow doesn’t work (probably somewhat due to the fact that it is crap, and they try to sell it like crap). I still see downturned faces walking to and from class every day.
Ooh… I’m suddenly not quite sure where I was going with this topic. Well, not exactly not sure, but I keep trying to think of arguments for what I’m trying to say, but immediately disprove them all–mankind’s wimpiness isn’t caused by today’s society–not completely, anyways. Most people have always been sheep–or at least the ones who weren’t died in battle and unfortunately were unable to reproduce (or, rather, reproduce as much), otherwise we wouldn’t have had the Mesopotamian, Egyptian, Greek, Persian, Roman, Aztec, Mayan, Chinese, Russian, British (and so on…) empires. Then, trying to think of the topic simply in terms of men… well, first, I don’t know for sure what the hell I’m talking about, and second, I was going to say something about there being so very many douchebags, but reading Plato’s Republic, the character Thrasymachus is a pretty accurate embodiment of such people–and it seems they weren’t terribly rare then, judging from the other readings. I’m really not sure, thus the lack of a conclusion. I really need to think these things through before I start writing.
Sorry guys, here’s some German rap to make up for it