I'm not the best & it's not even close: Notes on self doubt

It's a pity party and you're invited - the birthday special

foreword

Dear readers, i have been absent - i hope you noticed - and i apologise. I also have to say, i hate being vulnerable and i don’t do it well; it’s always too depressing when i actually think it’s hopeful. See, i thought this article was quite hopeful, a little funny yet honest. I asked my partner to read it to assess the hopeful to depression scale, he wondered where the hopeful parts were. Once again, I SWEAR I AM OK. It’s a sunny spring day, there’s a pink blossimg tree in the garden, it’s a grand prix weekend and we’re having a barbecue - it is also my birthday and i fucking love a pity party so let’s go.

To be totally honest, i let the algorithm and numbers get to me. I am writing, a lot. I juggle between three essays, they feed into each other and i love the process. I care deeply about the process, doing research and letting serendipity do its thing, i love putting a lot of effort into it.

I love writing, it is the one thing i have always wanted to be the best at. Yet the annoying voice in my head keeps screaming, NOT GOOD ENOUGH. I see the numbers, i can track the performance of my ideas, i fixate on the lack of engagement in my creation and i have started apprehending the publishing - maybe because, deep down, i know it’s not good enough. Will it ever be unless i am the best at it?

i am not the best, it’s not even close

I think i am too stubborn for therapy. There is no amount of reassurance, of self-reflection at my past victories, of gold star stickers (for real) that will change my mind. I see myself as a failure. There, now we all know. On the long list of things i wished to accomplish, i may have crossed one or two. On the short list of things i wish i would not have accomplished, i have crossed them all. I am an anti-dream accomplisher. I have manifested all wrong, prayed to the wrong gods, wished upon the wrong shooting star. But look at the list of good things, my therapist said during one session. I looked and it was pathetic, It’s not too bad i guess, i lied. I think it made it worse. Is that all i have to show for in my twenty-eight years of existence?

I am a big crybaby and this is my pity party.

I have a disillusion of grandeur coated in layers and layers of fear. A pearl that years of doubt and a terrible fear of failure have dissolved into a speck of dust. If you blow, even just a little, it will crumble like a house of cards. Maybe i believe in myself too much, i see myself accomplishing too much and i am too sure i will be grand. So much so that the tiniest failure cracks the whole mirror and it shatters. Instead i do nothing, take close to no risks and, for the longest time, avoided played the game: if i don’t do it, i can’t fail, therefore i can still be the best.

then i didn’t realise, i may be the clown but this is my circus

Dramatically, i am the only one who can change my life. Wait, no, that’s a lie. A lot of things can change one’s life.

I don’t take a lot of decisions but every decision i make turns to crap. At this stage, i consider it a talent - for hire if anyone is interested. My instincts are so bad it’s uncanny. I waste way too much time on unworthy quests and put way too little effort into the ones i desperately want. I’m looking at a stick and still hope it’ll turn into a wand but it is just a stick, throw it to the dog and let him destroy it. With this knowledge, i have stopped making decisions altogether, which in itself is an awful awful decision to make. And stupid, also. And awful, also.

So i float through life like a dead smelly fish, grateful i can hide the smell of putrefaction with the expensive Saint Laurent ‘Libre’. The irony.

Everything i touch turns to dust. Was it always like this?

when did the diamonds leave your bones?

I used to be in charge.

I tricked my brother into stealing snacks for me and taking the fall. It’s not really a decision nor an example of being a good big sister, but it’s part of the lore. When i was a toddler, i packed a bag full of what a kid believes they need (also a bottle of water) to run away, i told my mum i wanted to exchange her at the store. My parents always knew i’d leave the nest at the first opportunity. I was like that, sure of myself, i trusted my instinct.

Then i grew up, i made bad, terrible, awful decisions and lost all trust in my guts, but most importantly, i never tried and never failed at the things that matter. That’s until a launched this shitshow that is a bit chaotic and it feels like an incredible failure. The proof, written black on white, that i cannot write. I don’t want to be a trial-and-error, a persevering-through-it-all writer; i want to be the instant success (then instant regret, probably) writer. Because if i’m an instant success, surely that must be proof i’m the best.

But i keep going, i keep caring and i see tiny bits of growth through the decisions and perceived failures. I have mastered the art of finding content in any situation. For example, a year ago would i have booked yet again the wrong train ticket and had to pay again i would have raged at the universe, but when it happened on Wednesday, i was just thankful the controller was nice and that i got home an hour early.

And that, dear readers, is to live life fully. To find the beauty in the shattered mirror, to enjoy how the sun will reflect a thousand times instead of once.