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Will I Ever Get Over Being Shy?

Writer's picture: Feef MooneyFeef Mooney

Whoever can understand why a person would not like herself?

It makes no sense, particularly when you have been raised to believe in God, and therefore to confirm repeatedly, "God does not make junk."

Yet my earliest memories are of keeping journals, and in one of them listing every thing that was wrong with me. My nose was too big. My feet too big. My eyes too small. My hips too big. I went after myself, attacking every feature.

And I was not good enough. Even though, whatever my project, I worked long and hard to excel. If a paper were on wild flowers, I would contribute twenty pages, with hand-drawn illustrations, not submit the obligatory four page report.

Since I was five or six, I have pushed myself, and frankly, I don't know why.

Other children terrified me. School was a nightmare. Someone had told me that if you sneezed, you would be punished. I was literally trembling with anxiety in the company of my fellows. All I thought about was being alone.

I played with big dolls until I was absolutely too old to be seen with them. And then, when I had to give them away, I wept and wept, fearing what was to become of them.

Is this an attempt to cull pity? Oh no, hell no.

I grew into a very rebellious person, highly anti-authoritarian and privately confident. As I sharpened my skills, and became an avid reader, I chose authors as friends, and books protected and enlightened me. I learned sex from John Updike. I learned longing from DH Lawrence.

Every musical artist I loved befriended me. Whether they were my generation or not. This is another blog, so I won't list my musical bodyguards, suffice to say David Bowie and Kurt Cobain played these roles.

What I meant to express here is one thing. TRULY. Music helped me to transcend my lowly pitiable self. First, writing songs. Something I started doing when I was five. Then playing guitar. I was eleven. Then performing.

It wasn't a show-off thing. It was a way to get away from myself. It was to disappear into someone else. My real me could shrink, even become invisible. My over-thinking, judgmental critical me. And you know, I think even now this is why I perform. to unite with others, and to get the fuck out of my own head.

I may never get away from being a shy cuss. But I'll always plug in, play, and escape her, when given the chance.

Just to lose a little control, to let go, and to not be afraid of what might happen is the most liberating thing I have ever known. And, oddly, the most vulnerable, the most intimate, and the most exciting.

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J.P. McDermott
J.P. McDermott
Jun 25, 2024

I understand this. It’s the opposite for me. I think the only time I’m really seen as the real me is when I’m performing. But I could be wrong as I have a very long history of not knowing or understanding how people see me. There are many reasons why we do that thing we do.

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