Radvent, Day 2: Self Worth

I don't believe I've ever felt a lack of self-worth before now. There are too many other fascinating things to think about-- who cares if someone thinks I'm too loud or my top's too low or that my conversation's inappropriate? Don't look and don't listen, man! I truly believe that being unapologetically true to yourself (within moral reason) is a wonderfully freeing state of mind, and has the added benefit of unconsciously giving others around you the permission and confidence to be their own best selves, too. The time when I have felt the most influential in my life was also the time I was happiest and doing exactly as I wanted. I don't think there's a coincidence there. Happiness, confidence, and enthusiasm are catching.

That said, I obviously have moments of self-consciousness, which seem to be coming around more of late. More specifically, I have these moments where I question my self-worth during, of all things....conversation. I've been lucky enough to meet fantastic and fascinating friends, all super smart and witty. I call them our party crowd since we always see them at great cocktail parties, bars, band shows, or really any fun event. They are welcoming and warm, and have always been interested in me and what I have to say. But I don't feel like I have anything to say! At least not anything that would interest them-- my main topic of reading now? Babies. And these friends of whom I speak, they are an older set with either grown children or no children. At that stage in life, would YOU want to hear my theories on how to best strip cloth diapers or how I'm getting better results with manual expression instead of pumping? I didn't think so. When I was in school, I felt like I never had a shortage of things to talk about. I really enjoyed a course on the Constitution where we picked apart every single amendment and had rousing classroom discussions, then wrote impassioned opinion pieces defending our personal interpretations. I had great conversations with almost everyone in my life during that time. And my Latin American Cinema class especially blew open my mind to the histories and daily lives of many Spanish-speaking cultures. I simply couldn't stop talking about La Guerra Sucia, I just couldn't wrap my head around the vast atrocities (and their repercussions) visited upon all those Argentinians, and I REALLY couldn't believe I'd never learned any of this in high school history! I mean, shouldn't fairly recent civil wars be a major topic of interest when educating teenagers on their world? Not at my high school, evidently. But I digress.

These friends would listen patiently, if I spoke, and perhaps even contribute their own rejoinders. But in my effort to not be "that mom who talks of nothing but her child," I've mostly been saying nothing in group settings. (This sounds like yesterday's post-- damn you, whoever came up with that quote!) I figure if I just hang out and pay attention and listen, surely I can chime in with something valuable at some point, right? The problem is, I end up just...sitting there. Listening. Laughing at the appropriate moments. Smiling in a manner that must look just vapid. And contributing nothing. And when it's time for us all to go, I feel like a completely worthless conversationalist, useless as a friend, stressed out that I left no witty reparteés to remember me by, like just a piece of pretty furniture. Lame.

To this, I see three obvious solutions: don't hang out with those friends (suck); get new friends whose main point of attention at the moment is also babies (easier said than done); or read the news all damn day just in case I have to have a conversation about it (also suck). We're friends with two other couples with young children and I feel perfectly at ease with and happy around them, but hey-- did I mention we all have young children? It makes for a rather truncated schedule. I know, I know. I'm making excuses.

I suppose the solution to this low feeling is to stop gripping so tightly to my party crowd. Perhaps this sudden wordlessness is a quiet message that it is okay for me to let go-- it's okay to not identify with the cocktail set anymore. And host more in-home gatherings with the people with whom I can actually talk about vaccines and gentle discipline. I can't simultaneously belong both in the bar and in the nursery, even though honestly, I would like to. But with a change in priorities comes a change in habits, and I suppose that naturally leads to a change in interests and conversations. It DOESN'T mean a change in self-worth for the lesser.