Self-Titled Debut

Shy is defined by Merriam-Webster's as several things, including easily frightened, disposed to avoid a person or thing, or my favorite, sensitively diffident or retiring, reserved, or expressive of such a state or nature.

It has come to my attention that I am shy. I have been completely in denial about this my entire life. It has taken a friend telling a friend who told me that she thought I was shy for it to hit home. (Does that mean she is shy as well since she didn't tell me?)

My husband told me I probably thought I was outgoing because growing up I was always with my sisters, who are very outgoing and gregarious. The last time I went to an outdoor event with one of my sisters it was slow going as we walked through the crowd, stopping to talk to person after person who she knew and wanted to chat with who all seemed like very dear friends.

I do not think that I have problems meeting people or hate change or anything like that, but I do get nervous going to a new store I have never been in before. And my heart races a little at church during greeting time at the thought of walking up to someone I have not met and introducing myself.

The point is that I didn't know I was shy and now I know. Not painfully so, but shy in that I hesitate to speak up in a group unless directly called upon. I get nervous going to the dentist office (who doesn't?) and worry about looking awkward in public (again, who doesn't?).

One article I read said that in her pursuit of trying to make up for being reserved and not willing to meet new people she tried to perfect her image- hair, makeup, clothes- and instead came off looking like a snob who thought she was better than everybody. This rings a little true for me as well. I have been told that I was cold and unfeeling but I was processing my own feelings and hesitated to express them without first putting them through my filter. Perhaps it appeared in the situation that I had no feelings to express.

So now that I know more about myself I think I will try to use my gifts and talents accordingly. Except I'm still trying to understand what that means. But yesterday my neighbor came over for coffee and told me about her 85-year-old dad being upset at something said in jest by another relative, and how she was laid off from her part-time job at the dentist office and now must decide whether to find a new job or stay home. And I thought about what I had read about shy people being good listeners. And then last night my friend Amanda came over and there was very little conversation due to the five children under 4 running around and playing. But we just were together to make the evening pass a little faster while our husbands were at Bible study. And I thought about how shy people might enjoy being around other shy people because there is not as much pressure to talk.

My personality will not change due to the realization of another facet of who I am, but I feel a little less pressure to be someone I am not. I will continue to cross the line I sometimes feel I would stay behind to be safe, but in doing so maybe God is trying to make me into something He wants me to be, not someone I think I should be.