Right, I've decided to be a bit more frequent with my blog updates. I don't feel that I've got that much to say, but as we all know it's the quantity and not the quality that counts.
I have spent most of my life with tragically low self-esteem. I was, socially, a wasteland throughout my childhood - hopeless with other kids, introverted, intelligent, and convinced that I was ugly. I am by no means unique in this respect. A lot of people start out that way.
The past few years have consisted of me discovering that I'm more than that. I learned how to win people over with the bare minimum of effort (hint: be interested in them!), I put the books down and started talking to people, and I found out that I'm not Quasimodo's ugly step-sister.
I'm missing my gap year like crazy. The combination of responsibility and freedom was perfect for me; the feeling of doing something practically to help, talking to people about their problems, leading discussion groups, it was just right to push me to the next stage. I grew in confidence over that year, no doubt about it.
And now, to cap it all off, I'm loved in a way I never expected and sure as hell never deserved.
I am having quite a wobbly start at university. I'm being shy and introverted, and because of the nature of my course I'm doing a lot of reading, and I'm scared to get into the church side of things and not really sure how to go about it. But I'm not going to lose sight of who I am now; change in character is a one-way process from my experience and I'm glad of that because I really, genuinely liked who I was in my gap year. I hope and pray to have the guts to be that person here in Plymouth.
Interesting thing of the day: Plug your webcam in!
Bear
Sunday, 4 November 2007
Johnny the rugby-tackling alzheimer's patient
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Who Am I!!!!???
ReplyDeleteAh Scrubs. Life would be so worthless without it.
As to your predicament, I have always been and always been the geek of any group. However, i'm now very very good at being sociable, to the point where i'd say I may even be an extrovert. A lot of this came when I hit uni, and specifically halls of residence. There were so many people, all of whom were very different and had their own skeletons, I felt I could really be me.
Not everyone is lucky enough to end up in that sort of open group though. My only advice is just to be yourself, as if people don't like you for that, then you don't need them in your life. A large abstraction, but nonetheless very true.
From these blogs and our intermails, you seem ace, so definately just be you. And don't hide your religion, as it's something you're proud of. Theres a happy medium of being proud of your religion and not shoving it in peoples faces. One of my housemates is deeply Christian, and we all know it's a big deal to him and he does talk about it, but never preechily.
Hope I was of some use. Probably not. :D
Well spotted sir! Every time I find a new identity, it always turns out the same, so I think it's impossible to really reinvent yourself overnight. So I'm gonna wind up as myself eventually. :) Good Thing.
ReplyDeleteYeah, that reminds me, email me, foo. :)
yay - more frequent posts! :)
ReplyDeletei'd advise jumping in with the church stuff ASAP, as that will help to no end. find a church that looks ok, go there and talk to anybody who talks to you. if nobody talks to you, try somewhere else. if they talk to you and they're nice, go again. after a while, suggest a way in which you can contribute.
(p.s. this advice is pretty much taken from peter, alex & sarah; i wouldn't be arrogant enough to give advice about uni to a uni student :P)