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Transformation

4/3/2012

I was a shy child, no let’s change that; I was an extremely shy child. I rarely spoke to adults that were not my parents. I probably spoke to my aunts and uncles, but only out of politeness and on a “speak when spoken to” policy. I don’t know why I was so shy. My father was shy as a child and youth also, so maybe it’s an inherited trait. The nature versus nurture always fascinates me.

For every year of my elementary grades the teachers wrote in the comment section that they wished I would talk more. I never raised my hand. I never volunteered. I’m sure it was because I didn’t want to be wrong. I didn’t want to be ridiculed.

When I was in high school I was in a first time offered philosophy class my senior year. Only select students were allowed enrollment. I was among the chosen few. I never spoke. I never entered into a discussion. I was too worried about looking stupid or ignorant. I felt I never measured up to my peers in that class. I can remember at the end of the semester the instructor turning to me and asking me why I never spoke. I don’t recall what I told him. I know I was mortified.

That experience, thirteen years of shyness or silence in a classroom ,taught me a lot as a teacher. I could understand the fear of the shy child. I also knew it could be different and change could happen because when I went off to college I vowed to be different.

My freshman year of college I told myself this was a new beginning and I had to make a shift, if not now, when? So my first step was I said hello to every single person I passed when going to classes. What it taught me was how to handle the rejection of the person not responding, more than the response of someone. Each day I got stronger and stronger, without really knowing it. It was a quiet, subdued change. With my friends I was loud and boisterous and assertive; it was with strangers I needed strength.

By my Junior year I was a stronger, much more outgoing personality. The person that I was at home, the person that I was with my close friends was the person I would be in the classroom. I would now raise my hand for discussion. I would volunteer for projects. I could deal with strangers.

People that know me now would never believe that I was once a very, very shy person. Actually in all the reading I’ve ever done about shyness says that that person is still here, inside, I’ve just masked her and present a much more outgoing personality.

I’ve had to force myself to take the initiative. I‘ve had to force myself to make others feel comfortable. I’ve had to force myself to enter territories and grounds that I found foreign and uncomfortable. And it’s taught me that it can be done. Change can happen. No one can stand before me and tell me that nothing can be done, because I know that if the desire is there, the will, and the determination, a life can truly be transformed.