Confidence

I've never been a super confident person. In school, I dreaded the day that I had to present my Powerpoint on the benefits of wind power, or on the history of agriculture in New Jersey, or some other dumb shit I had to google for 30 minutes the night before. Stage fright is a huge thing for me. One time I went to do an open mic at my high school, and the MC whispered to me right before I went on. "Hey, just imagine them all naked, it'll make you more comfortable." He seemed like a confident guy so I said "Fuck it." I walked out. I looked out onto the crowd and it got hard to breath, so I did what the MC told me, and imagined them naked. Didn't help with the confidence, but I had a massive boner now, and everyone could see. Had to drop out and change my name after that one.

I'm not really confident off the stage either. Ever been to a baseball game and tried to start a chant? I could never. Imagine being the only asshole screaming, "Let's Go Dodgers, Let's go!" And no one else joins in? Just silence. Everyone looking up at you. "Sit down asshole!" Screams a 60 year old lady with a cane. Now you just have to sit back down and scrunch low in your seat, hoping they forget. But they wont.

Same thing in small groups of people. Just at a party, you got like 4 buzzed teenagers around you, some girls, and you want to seem cool and funny. So you'd probably tell a cool story about your trip to Ibiza or something. Me? I'd fucking clam up, slowly try to back away from the conversation hoping no one notices. I don't want to tell stories, cause I'm afraid they'll flop. And to me, jokes flopping is the worst possible thing in the entire fucking world. Imagine everyone's having a nice time, chilling, you think "a funny joke would be perfect right now, no one's attention is focused on one thing, all eyes will be on me" But the only thing you can think off is "You guys see that shit Donald Trump said" In a super loud voice, the room goes silent, everyone's looking at you. Why the fuck did I bring up politics? Time seems to stop. You're only options are to just stand up and fucking leave, or swallow the cyanide pill you keep in your pocket for this very moment. I can't be the only one who does that right? No? Just me?