Why being yourself can be so much more fun than being right

When I was young, I spent so much time trying to be right.

I tried so hard to damp myself down, to make myself smaller, to not talk so much or put my opinions so forcefully.

I lost sleep berating myself for saying the wrong thing, for being too forthright, for disagreeing when
I should have just stayed quiet. I felt that I was just too much in every way.

I was too emotional, too angry, too shrill, too opinionated, too loud, too talkative, too pushy, too dramatic, too … Well, pick your characteristic, I was too much of it.

What this felt like was that I was just intrinsically, inescapably wrong. I did not fit in. I made hundreds of resolutions to stay quiet, to be demure and modest, to defer. I broke every last one and I punished myself for it.

It took me years to realise that this feeling of being too much, of always being somehow wrong, was not exclusive to me. It may not be how all women feel (I envy those who never have) but I do think it is much more common that we realise, especially among women of my vintage.

As girls, it was hammered into us that we were meant to put other people first, to facilitate others to shine, not to shine ourselves. I love to perform, so I was called a show-off; I copped the sneer that I loved myself. Nothing could have been further from the truth. I didn’t like myself much at all, and was convinced others didn’t like me either.

No matter how hard I tried, I could not subdue my natural exuberance. And regardless of whether others punished me for it or not, I punished myself.

But others did punish me for it, of course. And, if I’m honest, I punished those who stepped outside what was deemed acceptable behaviour for a girl. I could bitch with the best of them.