Being the Story Anxiety Narrates

INT. ANXIETY'S SOCIAL EXTRAVAGANZA - LATE EVENING 

Cassie walks through double glass doors and takes a deep breath. 

She puts on a smile as she begins making her way through the crowded room, everyone is dressed in ball gowns and tuxedos with their face covered with a black mask, except for Cassie. Nonetheless, she introduces herself to every masked guest she comes across. 

She’s warm, inviting, and poised, and moves with a sense of confidence that's filled with ease. But underneath, anxiety is a huge surround sound speaker attached to her chest cavity. What's currently playing? “Where Do You Go” by No Mercy (Don't ask why. That was the first song that came to mind, and it kind of sets the mood)

Her skin starts to feel as if it's crackling like candy Pop Rocks, only because it’s ashy. She absolutely needs some lotion ASAP. How in the world did she forget to put on lotion? 🤦🏾‍♀️

She may be the only guest not wearing a black mask, but she continues to mask her anxiety, letting her inner confidence act not as a performance but as a catalyst to project comfort and safety in an awkward situation that doesn't feel so safe. 

Stay tuned for the awkward events that took place after she drank from the spiked punch bowl…… 

THE END

I’m honestly trying to figure out how my anxiety became this inner wrecking ball. 

People who have known me for years don't quite know me for this strained anxiety I've developed. They know me for my outgoing personality, my love of laughter even during my own traumatic situations, and my tendency to make corny jokes. I’m the person you reach out to when you want to be spontaneous. And I'm still all of those things, but with all this newfound anxiety, sometimes I jokingly ask myself, "Have I allowed life events to create this overthinking everything to my personality collection, like some sort of Pokemon ball, or am I just at a crossroads, witnessing a tug of war between who I used to be and who I'm meant to become? Honestly, it might be a little bit of both.

There was a time in my life when I would go to social events, and you couldn't pay me to talk to anyone. I was the person who would go find a corner to hide, then somehow found myself surrounded by three to five people having a really good conversation, wondering “how the heck I got here,” but also enjoying it. So compared to that I seem to have made progress lol.

Over the years, I’ve had to force myself out of my social anxiety, out of sheer necessity. I understood the only way for me to be in community, build relationships, especially professional ones, and get to know people was to push myself to be sociable, but sometimes I’m not always willing to wear the mask and rather retreat to a corner internally. 

Just last month, in October, I attended a Space Western themed Halloween murder mystery event. I’ve always wanted to do an activity like this, so when I saw the opportunity, I immediately took it, despite how much of a nervous wreck I was. 

During the game introduction, one of our hosts mentioned being intentional about including those who were introverted or nervous. It was much appreciated that he felt the need to ensure that everyone held space for those who most likely had their heart beating in their chest so much that you can practically see it. It made this new, scary, uncomfortable experience that I was willing to show up for all the more exciting, fun, and a safe space to just play. Because the idea was for me to just play. To connect with my inner child and just experience joy. I wasn't overthinking, worried about trying to say the right things, being someone else to be accepted, proving myself, nor did I feel like I had to know what I was doing. 

Oftentimes, we go into spaces and we create, and sometimes there are expectations to be sociable, share, and engage. We exhaust our minds by creating a thousand ways things could go wrong. We overthink every interaction, hello, introduction, conversation, salutation, and goodbye. We wonder how we might've been perceived, received, did our jokes land well, and sometimes, in my case, was I too direct? It becomes a juggling act that can leave our brains overworked for absolutely fucking nothing. 

The reality is that no social space is technically responsible for managing our emotional and mental gymnastics. It's our job to regulate our own nervous system and quiet that inner noise, and I’m not always successful at mediating the four-way Western quick draw duel between my brain and body, as well as my thoughts and my emotions. 

But wait, imagine a Western duel while the song “Where Do You Go” by No Mercy plays in the background 😂. Okay, I'm done being nonsensical. 

Down the line, my anxiety has made me its main character in my own story but over time I've learned how to mask my anxiety. I don't feel like it's completely a bad thing because in certain situations it forced me out of the iridescent seashell that I locked myself in, but kept it cracked open just enough for me to run back to it when I feel overexposed. 

Maybe the plot twist to this Anxiety Extravaganza doesn't have to be an awkward event that takes place after drinking a spiked punch bowl increasing my anxiety even further, maybe it's me learning that my anxiety isn't the villain that made me its main character in my own story, but the narrator who reminds me I'm still alive, showing up and still trying despite it all.