The Perks of Being "Stupid"

Finding safety in appearing stupid and embracing silly.

I am very hard to get to know. I attribute this to being desperately, terrifyingly scared at all times of not fulfilling an image that I want and being coined ridiculous. To more than just other artists, maybe this sounds eerily familiar. I am learning how to let go of that fear of appearing stupid, because at the end of the day, who honestly cares all that much.

While taking a course on Arthur Rimbaud in college, my professor explained that despite my eagerness to pick apart poetry meaning and share my thoughts about them with the class, she did not know all that much about me the way she did about everyone else. Instantly, I felt found out because I spent an embarrassing amount of time preparing what I would say and waiting for the appropriate moment to interject so that I could not be "wrong" when I eventually spoke. Which is silly, don't you see, because this was a poetry course where all interpretation is correct as long as the speaker backs up their claim.

My first instinct was to feel bad or ashamed that I could not easily tear my walls down but then I thought about how feeling bad about it wouldn't change the fact that it was happening. I am a very "in-my-feels" kind of person (according to my therapist) and sometimes I let these moments get the best of me, thus continuing that endless cycle of beating myself up without change. Like damn, we really are our biggest critics because I would beat myself down as if Rimbaud himself were anticipating my punishment for not being able to speak my mind in a poetry class.

I am very used to being ridiculed for my decisions, creative direction, and subversive views on a lot of pop culture. Overtime, these outsider opinions became distant voices haunting my illusions of choice about anything ranging from aesthetics to practical work. I could feel my soul receding into myself because of my anticipation of the negativity of others and my failure to stand my ground as myself. In other words, I stopped sharing myself with the world because I felt like everyone already thought my work and opinions were nothing but dumb.

Recently, I have been taking a step back before reacting with emotions and labeling myself as stupid. It has been difficult, admittedly, and it does not work at times, but I know the person that I am and want to become; the people outside of me do not. Growing up with anxiety, I used to comfort myself with the line, "I live inside of myself." which suggested that everything inside my brain was the real me so there was nothing to be embarrassed about because no one could actually see me being silly. As an adult, I realized that I want to live more than just inside of myself and I have the right to just as much as anyone else regardless of how "stupid" or "silly" my life choices and appearances may seem.

"I live inside of myself" has transformed into a reminder that I have total control over myself and I get to choose what outcome of personal choices because I made the choice. No one else's voice matters when it comes to my personal decisions because at the end of the day, I am the one who lives with my choices.

As an artist, this has completely changed my outlook on life. I am choosing to write and to make regardless of whether or not it is monetized or enjoyed my the masses. I am sharing content because I want to create a safe creative space for more than just myself. I am doing this for me because my choices matter and who I am and what I do gets to be my decision. I am learning how to embrace the accusations of being stupid or silly; who cares about such a thing when I am having so much fun just doing me?

Overtime, I will become easier to know as I embrace all of the characteristics of myself that people have found stupid or a waste; because I do not find these characteristics stupid. They are just me being a person and enjoying my time.