Shyness

Disclaimer: I realize that the pic is just gratuitous nudity, but I am a nudist damn it!

This post is part of my Life Thoughts series that attempts to document and share my views on life and the principles that guide me through it.

I have always been a very shy person. Usually people that have met me within the past few years have a hard time believing this. They remark about how I have no problem wearing attention-drawing clothes, nearly indecent underwear at underwear parties, go nude and how quickly I'll talk with new people. All this gives people a false sense of my self-confidence in these situations. Nonetheless, the truth is, I've always been shy. I've typically done whatever was necessary to not stand out too much and spent much of my life trying to appear non-sexual. My best guess is that these were coping mechanisms related to growing up gay, but who knows.

I love to play tennis. I normally play at a park where you can easily pick up a game with someone as long as you are willing to ask someone if they'd like to play/hit with you. I recall a few times when I was hitting against the wall beside someone else that was doing the same. I wanted to hit with him, after all, that's why I went to the park, but because of my shyness, someone else would come, and they'd hit with him instead. I hate this because my being "chicken shit" caused me to miss out on something that I would have enjoyed. Whenever this happened, I would promise myself to never not do something simply out of irrational fear.

When you think about it, we'll never reminisce about the things that we DIDN'T do. We'll never speak of things we didn't do to our family or friends. Life is really about what we do. In fact, I've written a whole post explaining my belief about how relationships and things we do are the very things that most enrich us on our journey through life.

Therefore, I've reconditioned myself to not allow irrational fear to prevent me from doing what I really want or should do. As time has passed, it has become less conscious and more automatic. That's not to say that don't still have to fight a little fear sometimes, but at least I do a much, much better job than I did just a few years ago and feel that my life is more rich as a result.