When I was younger, I had this feeling that there was this handbook that I'd  never gotten that explained how to be, how to laugh, what to wear, how to stand  by yourself in a hallway. Everyone else looked so natural, like they'd all  practiced together and knew exactly what to do, even just the way that they'd  push the hair out of their face, my experience was pretty much the opposite. I  was conscious of how I sat, how I smiled, and when I was alone with another  person, I had no idea what to do or what to say. I could just feel myself panic. It  sucked. I'd imagine what people were like when I wasn't around, how they'd  compare notes on how I didn't quite fit, or even worse, maybe they just wouldn't  notice. So I tried to pick up the patterns. I wore what they wore and said what  they said. I even wrote "smile more" on a sticky note, and over time, it sort of  worked in a way. I made a version of me that fit in, whatever that means. But as  I grew older, the patterns kept changing, and it took so much effort to keep  learning them, and I was still stuck with the problem that I'd started with, being  terrified of the moment when my tricks stopped working. I think it took me too  long to learn something. That even though there is a thing called fitting in, that  it's something that you can learn in practice. Those pages are so thin compared  to who you are, that the way to become natural, like I wanted to be so badly, is  by forgetting what you're trying to be to other people. And if there is a handbook, you probably get to write it yourself. 



آخر تعديل: الاثنين، 19 أكتوبر 2026، 8:30 AM