When I was in college, I had what I always refer to internally as a “crisis of depth of character.” 

What did that look like for me? 

Well, for example, I was friends with some folks who liked to listen to obscure acoustic artists I’d never heard of. Folks who played instruments. Folks who read, wrote and discussed poetry in their spare time.

Me? I listened to the Shrek 2 soundtrack like it was going out of style, and I only ever giggled my way through one singular poetry class in college.

I wasn’t sexy enough to be considered “sexy,” but I was far from “bookish” or “nerdy.”

I was smart, but I was never top of the class. 

I was funny, but not particularly quick-witted or SNL material. 

When I graduated, I put this “crisis of depth of character” behind me.

Lately, though, over the last few months, some of those thoughts have been creeping back in. 

I’ve been feeling like my raunchy side can be exciting, but I don’t really have a “sexy” side. 

I’m a lot of fun, sure, but I’m not always the center of attention or a social butterfly. 

And what I once called a “crisis of depth of character,” I don’t use that terminology anymore, because underground music and poetry and inherent, effortless sexiness doesn’t equate “depth” of character.

I think that, in many ways, I just haven’t been feeling like I’m ENOUGH. That’s the better way to put it. 

I write a lot about body acceptance, but these insecurities are, for once, not physical ones. I can write for ages and ages about my stretch marks and soft belly, but it’s hard for me to write about the fact that more often than not, I don’t feel like I should go out on the weekend because what if the people around me think I’m annoying? Or worse, what if they don’t think of me at all, because I’m a nonentity? 

These are the anxieties that roll around in my head, the insecurities that have nothing to do with the way my jeans fit. 

We’re always bombarded with the message, “Be yourself; everyone else is taken.” And that’s wise, sure. But what do we do if we feel like “ourself” isn’t enough? 

I think there are a couple issues at hand here, the first being that by comparing our traits, our beliefs or our hobbies or our likes and dislikes with other people, we are forcing them to exist on the same plane. I’m not trying to be existential, but we, as individuals, are only living in our own head. Our beliefs evolve, the same as our likes and our dislikes. The guy sitting next to us has his own set of traits, beliefs, hobbies, likes, dislikes, etc. They have nothing to do with ours. 

We live in a world where everything is compared to everything. Social media makes these comparisons both an immediate and normalized reaction, though it doesn’t have to be. What another person is doing in their sphere doesn’t affect what we are doing in our sphere.

This is something I struggle with. 

Take my music taste, for example. Because I have been friends with many, many people who equate mainstream music with being shallow or uncultured, it has affected me in more negative ways. 

I, for a long time, tried to listen to the artists they did, and try to understand why that music went hand-in-hand with “coolness” or “worldliness.” 

Spoiler alert: it doesn’t. They just acted like it did, and I listened instead of existing in my own sphere. 

Music is just one example, but sub in clothes, where you live, general physical appearance and you get the same results.

Someone else’s sphere doesn’t touch yours AT ALL, unless you make it touch. 

And so here I am, a 25-year-old person, and I still worry about stuff like this. 

I should be wittier.

I should be sexier.

I should be edgier.

Should be, should be, should be.

Why?

Where does the “should be” come from? Why do I have it in my mind that the way I am right now isn’t good enough? 

For me, it’s not enough to be told to “be yourself; everyone else is taken,” so I won’t spew that particular platitude.

However, consider this:

Right now, everything that you have experienced in your past, leading up to this very second right now, has made a mark on you, whether you really felt like it at the time or not.

And so, with all of those millions of marks, NO ONE is marked the way you are. No one on the planet but you has experienced the exact unique set of experiences you have. That makes you absitively posilutely one-of-a-kind.

Everything you’ve ever said, every thought you’ve ever let cross your mind, has also made a mark on you, further adding to the unique markings that adorn you. 

If you think about it like little stitches, your quilt is going to be different from any other person who exists right now, any person who has existed before you, or any other person who will ever exist long after you’re gone.

That’s a massive concept to get your head around, trust me, but I like that better than I like “everyone else is taken,” because it IS a big deal. It’s not a matter of “You’re special, so act like it.” It’s a matter of “you are the only person like you that has ever existed or will ever exist.”

So, why spend your time wishing you were different? Wishing you were “more” anything, or “more” like someone else, who is 100 percent unique in THEIR own right? 

(See, I live alone. These are the sorts of spirals I go through. This might SEEM like a massive existential ordeal, but to me, it’s a typical Thursday evening.)

Anyway, it’s just something to chew on. I hadn’t thought too much about the crisis of depth of character thing in a while, but it resurfaced recently when I was extra down-in-the-dumps about being single (that’s a post for another time).

I was feeling very whiny, with all sorts of unhealthy thoughts, like “why doesn’t anyone like me?” or “what should I change so that someone likes me?”

(If you’d like to revisit how not feeling “good enough” has squatted on my dating life in the past, by all means, click here.)

Trust me, I know that’s a slippery slope. I know it, I’ve lived it, so I get it. But something as simple and commonplace as a bad day can shift our perspective into questioning why we are inherently the way we are, and why we like what we like, and so on and so forth.

It’s exhausting, constantly questioning yourself and being insecure about what you’ve got going for you. I’m hoping that this summer, maybe, I can focus on my creative priorities and self-care, and maybe the secureness in myself will follow.