Standing Up for Standing Out

I recently got back from a leadership camp where I got to be a peer mentor. As I walked through the almost surreal experience, meeting new people, making countless friends, and building lasting relationships (hopefully). It was a great time. I hope that it becomes a habit of mine.

But I guess the biggest point I want to make is that there was this atmosphere of "we are all new here, so lets meet each other." The uniting force of loneliness was something that brought all of us together, brought down awkward barriers and allowed social faux pas. You could go up to someone who you had met yesterday, tell them you had completely forgotten their name, ask for it, and go on like you were friends. Ask them about their ambitions, about their hopes and desires. You could confide in them some of your dreams, allow enthusiastic behavior to flow, and just be friendly.

Why then does being friendly supply such a fear and provide such criticism? Whether it's the junior high "cool table" to the college clubs, to the rivals between universities, there is an attitude of "we are who we are and you are you, don't mess with this system." Why is there such exclusion? Why is there such a fear of reaching out of our bubble and going to see what is on the other side of the fence? Why don't we explore more? I believe it comes down to one main cause with two opposite reactions, the inability to accept personal imperfections.

I believe that we are shy because we see our weaknesses better than any one else. We tend to want to cover that weakness and seem as though we are very close to perfect.When we reach out and try to make new friends, we risk the chance for rejection and what may seem to us like public embarrassment, and we don't want to go through that. We don't feel comfortable risking that.

On the other hand, when we have a group we feel comfortable in, we like the predictability that comes with it. We like their acceptance of us despite our weaknesses. The fact that they either see our weakness and accept us regardless, they are blind to our weakness, or they understand and share our weakness and so we are comfortable with them. When another tries to join however, we don't like the unpredictability they bring. We don't enjoy how they might stir the waters with their opinion of our weakness. So we fall into a defensive exclusionary attitude because we are afraid they won't accept our weakness.

I think the only cure in this is the acceptance of our weaknesses. When I say acceptance, I don't mean that we stop trying to better ourselves, rather that we become comfortable with the idea that we don't need to be perfect now, rather we need to progress towards perfection. We worry less about the comments people make on our present weak state and accept that we will one day progress to a better life. We set goals and do better for ourselves, not because of the criticisms of others. We stop trying to impress others by covering our weaknesses. When this happens, we are more capable of reaching out to other to include them in our group because we know that although we have a weakness, we're working on it, and it will get better. We accept them with their weaknesses because we understand our own.

We feel more comfortable venturing outside of our click of friends to meet others. Our weaknesses no longer hinder us to stay reserved and isolated. We are able to make lasting friendships and enjoy the life that is far too short.

So I'm going to get back to the beginning, I got to meet a lot of people, I made a lot of friends (even though I forgot names almost on a constantly) and they were ok with it. They did not exact perfection, and neither did I. We enjoyed the company on the road to perfection that we are all on.

A weakness is not a custom made fault, rather a customary growth point. Don't let the points of growth you have right now hinder you from growing with others.