Journal of Inadequacy

Trying to pinpoint my own feelings of inadequacy. Hopefully someone else can relate.

I’ve never been one to be shy around women. Never seen a need to be shy, if I’m honest. Especially if she’s someone I’m interested in " never really been too shy to at least talk to her normally. I remember as early as middle school, with the first girl I ever considered to “like”, I talked to her almost every day. Seamless. Natural. Through high school and freshman year of college, with different girls at different times, never felt shy to have at least a basic conversation. Ask them out? Maybe eventually. A good bit shy there, but that’s not what I’m getting at. The point is, I never have any problem with conversing with a girl of interest.

 

Not until recently. Completely new girl, introduced by a friend of mine. Probably one of the most stunning girls I’d seen. I know that’s cliché and all, but I actually mean it. Honestly don’t even know why I’m writing this, guess just to get the feeling out, but there it is. That’s basically all I know about her (without a bit of deduction). I suppose were I to describe her as fully as possible, she would be a decently intelligent, extroverted girl who prizes family over most, if not all, tangible things. Makes friends easy due to the extroverted nature and beauty. Generally kind, unless irritated in a prolonged manner or something of value is devalued. All guesses, mind you, but they seem to be good guesses.

 

And despite my ability to describe the past girls in depth, personality and appearance, the new girl whom I know next to nothing about is the one which causes me to be shy. Honestly, it makes no sense to me. Not in the slightest, which may be why I’m writing this. Maybe. Seems to be more than that. But the fact that this one makes me shy, so bashful to make even the lightest of conversations, the simplest of hello’s, makes me intrigued. More so than any of the prior girls of interest, the simple fact that she makes me shy, and ashamed of the results of that shyness, makes her infinitely more interesting than the others I know so much more about. She’s different.

 

Now, one could theorize a solution as to why I’d be shy around this one: I actually think (or, to be more accurate, thought) I had a legitimate chance with the new girl, leading to the shyness due to the potentiality being realized. The only issue is that she’s not the first girl I’ve had a chance with. Since I was not shy with those I had a prior chance with, that then must mean the chance with her is not the cause of the shyness. Then what?

 

Allow me to have some introspection: I believe love is the summation and payment for actions done to another. If one does not ever act in a manner which could bring about the acts which would result in the payment of love, then love would never come about and the individual would be undeserving of the love. Now follow me here. If an individual were ever to find himself incapable of feeling love, or of reciprocating love, recognizing acts eventually deserving of love, or find himself incapable of producing act(s) which would warrant an eventual love from the other, then it stands to reason that that individual is undeserving of love. He has no means to bring it about, sustain it, or reciprocate it. He is simply incapable.

 

Perhaps that is me. Or, at least, who I perceive myself to be. Not necessarily entirely incapable of the above (as, unless this change happened between the old girls of interest and the current one), but rather see myself as incapable of bringing about the actions which would ever lead to the final result of any relationship: love. It is perhaps not that she is the direct source of my shyness, but rather my interpretation of myself in relation to her. Much like how the number 1 is half in relation to the number 2, but a quarter in relation to the number 4. The quality of one changes dependent upon how the number 1 chooses his perception of another number, and seemingly less valuable the higher the number.

 

The girl, whom I know next to nothing about, is perceived as so far beyond myself, so far beyond my means of attainment, or even appeasement, that I am left with such a feeling of inadequacy when comparing myself to her resulting in an unworthiness. This unworthiness translates directly to an imbalance between my maximum level of attainment and the “league” I perceive her to be in. This imbalance causes the only thing to be brought about between the two to be shyness on the individual feeling inadequate.

 

Yet why does this happen? Why do I see her as so far above, or myself as so far beneath " or both? Why would this feeling of inadequacy sprout up within me, yet seemingly not in her mind? The answer? It isn’t there. This chasm I’ve perceived to be between us is either not there or is not recognized as any distance by her. It is only something within my own mind which I myself cannot come to grips with and, in the midst of trying to do so all I feel is the same feeling of shyness and inadequacy. The shyness has literally nothing to do with her or even some actually existing gap between the “leagues”…it is only in my mind.

 

Yet now the final question remains (or hopefully final, as this grows more pathetic by the word count), why do I perceive such a gap, if in fact there is none or that it is a non factor? In truth, I don’t know. I suppose I just do. I just see myself as incapable of feeling love or ever be deserving of it. Including any precursors of love, such as a relationship. I suppose I see myself unworthy of being with anyone, no matter how long a duration. And perhaps it is this feeling, the feeling of inadequacy itself, which makes me truly inadequate.