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Thursday, October 25, 2012

Taking Our Space

I'm not great at blogging yet. This second paragraph showed up in my drafts folder so I don't know if I already published it or not. It's worth saying again, anyway. I wrote a middle school book about bullies called HANNER AND THE BULLIES which again takes up this simple idea. When we don't take up our rightful space we create a kind of social and psychological vacuum in the world which is immediately filled up by something that shouldn't be there--bullies for one.

Some of us feel entitled to "take our space" in life and some of us must somehow earn that entitlement for ourselves. My husband, for instance, has always pushed right ahead just as if everybody liked him. I suspect he cares somewhat whether or not people like him, but it is not necessary for him to "push ahead." I think he expects people to like him, for he is pretty satisfied with himself. Whereas I, like you, felt unsure to "push ahead" as if I was feeling already accepted. For most of my life I needed to prove myself somehow. Some of us have mild social anxiety until we risk ourselves often enough and see that it doesn't "kill us." It is possible to get to the point of "hey we're all just people here, aren't we, and I'm a people, too, so there!!

1 comment:

TR said...

I just wanted to share a success story relates to taking our space and taking risks. I hope it will inspire others who are struggling with this. I have dealt with depression and insecurity and thoughts of being seen as a loser and believing I was. A few months ago I was in the throes of a depression and was trying to come up with ideas to help me out of it. I decided I needed to get back into running. I signed up for a marathon because I needed the goal to get me out running. I started training and was discouraged facing these long runs alone. I felt sad and jealous of people who were running in groups with their friends. I also kept focusing on being a loser because I didn't have friends to run with. There is a girl in my building who was training. I never liked this girl much but I was jealous that she had this great group of friends and a and a boyfriend. They were all traipsing for NYC marathon. It was so painful to see her. I told my sister and she said it was the perfect opportunity for me to say, hey, can I run with you guys? Im training too. Well, I was too nervous to ask her. I went to work and thought about it. I wrote her an email and asked her if I could tag along in the long runs. I was so scared about what these people would think of me but I made myself do it. 3 months later, not only have I completed a sub four marathon, and made several new friends, I have helped these people too. I ran a different marathon a day before new York. New York is hard to get into so I chose another city that I always wanted to see. When new York was canceled, my group was soooo disappointed. They were just going to wait until next year. When I told them how I completed the marathon in less than 4 hrs, they were so inspired to run. They found a small marathon in another state and did it yesterday. I was there to cheer and run several miles with many of them. I helped them through the hardest parts. It was an amazing experience for everyone. So.....my point of this story is this: take your space, step out if your comfort zone even if it hurts like hell, and you will be rewarded. Hell, you may be helping others too. God is good and he rewards those who believe in themselves and take risks. We all have stuff we are dealing with...you don't have to be perfect. You can bless others. You can help others while helping yourself. Thank you Arline for all that you do.