I questioned this post long before I began to write it. I had this little whisper in my ear telling me not to because it was going to make me come off as conceited and full of myself. I didn’t know the words to say as to not offend anybody and also not have people think about me in a negative kind of way. Well just a few days ago I started to hear another voice. A voice that started to get louder and louder. Eventually louder than the other whispers. A voice saying “You earned it!”. I did. So here it goes.
I am going to be completely transparent with you. It was hard to open up like this but I can’t tell you the story of how I got confidence without telling you who I was before.
I grew up in a single parent home with my mother and my twin brother Austin. Austin and I were always around our many aunts and few uncles. You can see that we were raised by only woman for the most part. I tend to pick up habits from my environment just like when you start hanging around somebody new and you then start to mimic some of the things they say on accident. Well I was around females most of my life and tended to have feminine qualities. Sometimes it was my posture. Sometimes it was the way I thought and the things that I said.
So coming from a child who was in the stage of self identity, it was extremely hard for me when people would laugh and say that I was a girl. I would get picked on regularly and called names that I didn’t even know what they were until I got older. I got picked on and I didn’t understand why.
During middle school I started liking girls and girls started liking me but it was still a constant battle because at that age, I realized how horrible bullying could be. The girls that I liked would like me when I was alone with them but treat me horrible when their was an audience because they didnt want to be made fun of for liking the “gay boy” in school. That was the first time I contemplated suicide but that will be another story. It built one of the worst insecurities I have ever had in my life.
Once I reached high-school, I thought that things would be easier. I had my first girlfriend during my freshman year. Due to my morals, I refused to be intimate with her and after a year I found out that the whole time I was a side piece when her “girlfriend” wasn’t around. Yeah that destroyed me considering that once the school found out, the bullying was 10x’s harder. Sophomore year I dated another girl and she was honestly my first love. I never felt a love like this and I knew for a fact that she would be the one.
Well right before summer break she wanted to take a “break” and see other people until school started. Yet again, I was crushed. I went through an extreme depression where I fought for her to open up and tell me why. I later found out that she also left me to be with a girl. That she lied and said her name was Nate just so that I wouldn’t find out. Well many people new before me and the bullying intensified to the point that I didn’t have confidence in anything. I didn’t think that I was ever going to be man enough to be with a woman. I never thought that I would be strong enough to be good at any sports. I never thought that I would be smart enough to ever become anything and I was drowning in pain.
Drowning so deep in pain that I began cutting myself and other forms of self harm. I figured that if I was going to feel pain, I might as well be in control of some of it. Questioning myself “Why are you like this Adam? Why do you only hang out with only women? Why can’t you get along with many guys? Why are you so weak? Why can’t you be like everybody else?”
Well one day about a year after I graduated high-school, my twin brother and I were invited to go to the club with six of our female friends. They liked to bring us to occasions like that to keep the guys from harassing them. After a few hours of dancing and underage drinking, we decided to start heading to the car where our sober friends were waiting for us. Told you I was going to be transparent.
On the way to the car we passed a group of guys posted up on the wall. One of the guys laughed and said “Look at these fags!” while pointing at my brother and I. With a little bit of liquid courage in my system I turned and asked if he was talking to me. He replied “Yes” while snickering with his boys. “Yall have to be gay hanging around only girls.”
That was it. I couldn’t take it anymore. I was never a fighter but I was always good at hurting with my words and dammit I was fed up. So I flamboyantly did 2 snaps and said “Im going home with six beautiful woman while you are going home with a group of guys. That actually seems a little more suspect than me and my brother right now, and to answer your question, no we are not gay, not that it matters anyways. We were actually invited here specifically to keep guys like you from stealing away these beautiful women’s joy. And now that I’ve looked at yall, a few of your friends were actually hitting on some of my friends earlier tonight. So although I have nothing against gay people, you clearly do, so let me get something straight. Me hanging out going home with woman will always be more masculine than another man, like yourself, trying to show off how tough and hard you are, just to make your homeboys, other men, feel that you are more of a man. So I am going to finish my night on good terms and you can continue trying to impress your guy friends.”.
I just knew that we were going to get jumped that night but what actually happened is the dudes only said a few more jabs trying to piss us off. Nothing they said could change the facts that I just threw into their faces and my lovely friends and I walked back to the car and had a great rest of the night. That night taught me that at the end of the day, I can only be who I am and I can only impress the ones that truly care for me. That night I overcame the insecurity of people thinking that i was gay and I actually used that same response many times after. The more I responded that way, the easier it was for me. That’s when a lightbulb clicked on.
If my worst insecurity could be destroyed just by putting myself into the situation to beat it, then what happens if I put myself into other uncomfortable situations. I remember sitting down and thinking about all of the events that, at one point, hurt my feelings or had me thinking that I wasnt good enough. I wrote them down and figured out what I could possibly do to fix it. Before I knew it, my insecurity of being weak was killed simply by going to the gym and pushing myself. My insecurity of my weight and how skinny I was was simply erased by leaving the house in tight fitting clothes or even wearing all spandex.
In doing so, I have made it a goal to face my fears and insecurities to the point that i joined the military, jumped out of planes, swam with sharks, started nude modeling front of strangers in art classes, had some of the best times of my life in some of the roughest parts of town and even faced my fears of wasp and heights as a tower climber. So if you made it this far understand that this is why I said that I earned the right sound conceited or full of myself. This is how i got confidence. It was a hard journey that I had to fight everyday, completely alone. Now that I was able to find the secret, I am now sharing it with you.
If you dont have confidence in yourself, simply sit down, evaluate what you are insecure about and why. Once you find your “why”, jump into the fire. If you are scared to talk to a man or woman, take a breath and say “Hello”. If you are insecure about your looks, step outside without makeup. If you are scared of being on stage, sing karaoke with a group of friends. Who knows? I felt like insecure to write this but this isn’t me bragging. This is me celebrating my success at overcoming the hardest obstacles I have ever had to face. Finding my confidence. Never be afraid to celebrate things that you have overcome. Finding out who you are and building confidence will bring peace and happiness in your life.
If you have a story like this that you would love to share, feel free to write me or send me an email. I would really love to read it.
