Shyness by Lucky

You probably wouldn’t know it from interacting with me, or reading the Slow Lane pieces, but I am shy. I was thinking about this last week-end, and asked my sweety about it. I asked her if she ever felt shy around me, because, as I admitted, I sometimes felt shy around her. This precipitated a broader discussion of shyness, which I want to share, because it seems so relevant to the opportunity each of us has, to be ourselves and change the world.

We acknowledged our private shyness with each other, but we went on, to look at what leads to shyness and how it often gets played out.  For us, it seemed to revolve around the others seeing parts of us that we ourselves see barely and are unsure about. Suddenly these aspects of our selves are in the relationship spotlight.

We have a relationship where strangeness is somewhat welcome. Thank God! But this openness invites out of us all kinds of marginal characteristics. I like the welcoming attitude of my partner, but I’m not so sure about it when something shows up.

Anyway, looking at ourselves in relationship soon led to looking at ourselves in the world, in our community. I will confess a kind of shyness that regularly afflicts me, which I hide, in a moment, but I want to address the phenomenon of shyness first. I’m not talking here about introspection, I hid there for a while, I had Myers-Briggs to sanction my hiding then, instead I’m referring to the tendency I, and other people, share. That is, to keep our tenderest parts away from others. I’m discovering some of my tenderest parts, represent some of the aspects of my self that I am most unsure about,  they are also some the most important to share, because they contain my deepest and most vulnerable hopes and fears, worldly concerns, connections, and wisdom.

Shyness has been the way I have justified my reticence to be seen. It is so easy to say I was born shy. That’s just the way things are. I am shy, but that isn’t just the way things are. I am learning to overcome my shyness, to become visible, to even let myself as a disabled person be seen. I don’t feel comfortable doing it. I don’t like bearing any real scrutiny, especially my own, but I am learning that if I want to be free, I’ve got to free myself. It is a wonderful surprise finding out that freeing myself enhances the chances for a more wide spread outbreak of freedom. My shyness seems to be connected to the shyness in the world.

I don’t know about you, but I don’t relish anyone knowing about, much less seeing, my secret relationship with myself. I’m learning that the world of others (that includes my sweetie, you, the rest of my community, and the other-than-human world I belong to) suffers from a lack of freedom, choice, connection, and real vitality, when I let my doubt run me. Shyness is just one more way I let Mystery down.

After writing those words, I have to face the way I hide — my shyness. I am finding, thanks to our mutual inquiry, that I am shy about many things. But the one that is operating here, is the way I don’t really let you know about my writing. I know that sounds funny, especially coming as it does, inside one of my Slow Lane pieces. But, the truth is, that I have written three books (I don’t really know if they are any good) in the last several years, and I have not talked with anyone (except Xan) about them or their contents.

I have kept quiet about this. Why? I’ve told myself I’m shy, but a more informative truth would be that I have a hard-time letting anyone know I care that much and that I feel really vulnerable. I am proud of the work of writing, in terms of time, energy, and commitment, but I am anxious and fearful about letting anyone in on the ideas I express. They reveal too much about me. It seems like I am open and transparent, that’s what the Slow Lane would suggest, but the truth is, I am still hiding. I want you to know about my work and I don’t. I am proud of it, and I’m not. I can barely bring myself to acknowledge what I have spent the last part of my life on, and I feel like a fool, but I keep quiet anyway.

The books, the first one written when I was alone in 2007 & 8, the next (in 2009), compiled of early Slow Lane pieces and addressing transformation, and my recently completed True Things, have kept me awake, engaged, and alive. And, they reveal so much about me, and the world I live in, that I am hesitant to even let on they exist. Extrapolating from my reticence I wonder how many people are still sitting on themselves?

I don’t condone selficide, I tend to think of it like I do ecocide, but I have to admit, I contain and practice this contradiction. I swim in deep waters from time to time. I try to bring back what I see, what I hope will make a difference, but I am not really an unbiased reporter, because I keep secrets. I know I’m holding back. I suspect I’m not alone. Life is asking me to fess up. I guess that is because Life invented me. To the extent that is true, I can forgive myself. But I believe the truth is Life’s creation too. I am only a human being, being very human, I bear a foolish broken heart, because I can’t live up to what I’m aware of. They say the truth shall set you free, and maybe that is true, but to be free I have to get around me. And, pretending to be shy when I’m not doesn’t free anyone.