insecurity

[I keep going back and forth on whether I want this post to be password protected. For now, it is public. That may change.] this week, i read this article (ignore how many times he uses the word "gift"), and it has me thinking a lot about insecurity. articles, when combined with real life situations, result in blog posts. i have learned the hard way that my level of anxiety is a pretty good indicator that something in my life needs to be examined, evaluated, checked for fruitfulness. this week, i have felt my anxiety level rising. thankfully, i am a fairly self-aware person, so to say that my anxiety level is rising simply means that it is slightly higher than next to nothing, because i have somehow managed to cultivate a life where i can hold things loosely (even when, perhaps, i shouldn't). anyhow, my anxiety level has been rising. so i have begun to ask myself why. and here's what i've got: i feel really good about where i am right now. things are looking up. things that were hard to walk through are not so hard, because at least now i feel like i have others beside me. i consider my life six months ago, and it was full of uncertainty, full of hurt, full of lament. today, i see hope, i see relationship, and i feel known. but here's the thing... amidst this sense that life is really good, i am anxious. i feel so incredibly insecure. i find myself reflecting on interactions with others wishing i could take back some of my words, or wondering what would have happened if i had said what i really wanted to say in a particular moment. i. feel. so. vulnerable. i feel as though i have laid myself bare, that i have put myself on the line, and that i have allowed myself to push into something. and i am terrified. i am so afraid that at any moment people will discover just how annoying i am, just how much of a loser i am, or just how much they only tolerate my presence. i am waiting for the other shoe to drop, because now i have something to lose. six months ago, i could take a risk. i could say all i wanted about young adults at UPC because i had nothing else to lose. things are different now. the thing about being known by others is that it necessarily gives them the opportunity to reject you...to your face. see, if someone we don't know dislikes us, we can say its because they don't really know us. but when someone who knows you, who knows your hopes, your fears, your dreams decides they don't like you, there's no way of reasoning our way around that. and this is where my current insecurity lies. it lies in the fear that one day i will wake up and realize that what i have is gone. or even worse, that what i thought i have was never there to begin with, and that i was deceiving myself the whole time. where is the gift in my insecurity? i don't see a gift right now. i only see the pieces of myself that i am afraid will push people away, and i fear there is nothing i can do to stop that from happening. this makes me anxious, and thus, makes me reflect on how i can handle this better. how i can understand better where my security lies and how to live out of that place rather than this place of fear. still thinking.