"Hey. What is your name" I asked.
"Yen. And you?" She answered, looking at me suspiciously.
"Tim. Just Tim" I wholeheartedly smiled.
Yen is my first presential friend. That means I had many friends before… from other countries. Social anxiety does that because it is immensely easier to deal with people you can’t see, hear, or feel, than people who can look you in the face and create all kinds of criticism, which can easily destroy you in a matter of seconds.
Of course, I had seen her before in Kenpo class, a martial art, and there was something about her that caught my attention. Something about her brown eyes being way too dark, contrasting with her clear, curly long hair. When you have been hurt throughout your life, you seek like-minded people because it’s easier to speak to someone who might understand. For some reason, something inside me recognized hurting people by an abismal feeling in their gaze.
Still, I lacked social skills and I was blunt, despite my overthinking habit.
“I can drive you close to your home if you like” I added
“Yeah, he’s cool,” Robert said, approaching while untying his kimono belt. Robert was little, but his belt was purple and mine white… which makes him my superior. He was 13 years old and I was 20 and lived on the road I took to go home. The Sensei asked me if I could give him a lift. Turns out Yen also did live close by.
Since that moment, each time after class I would take these two in my car and drive them home until I finally decided to ask her for a number. I had anxiety for quite a while so I learned the skill of not “look so weird” despite actually failing about it. Still, she must have seen something in me because she agreed.
At first, I just offered my help if she needed transportation. I wanted to build a slow relationship, but without knowing, I had made a terrible mistake. Offering money. At least between a man and a woman in this part of the world, that tends to mean a second intention, but I genuinely just wanted to help.
Well, I was never a millionaire, but everyone need some phone credit once in while.
“Why are you helping me?” She texted me once “Are you expecting something back?”
“Well, imagine if you had something like a nice plant. You want to see it grow, become beautiful, maybe for the entire world to see, and even spread! I am helping you with that feeling in my heart” I said. Now that I remember it I realize I am kind of an odd fruit.
“I see. That’s actually something nice of you to say”
It hits differently when someone on the other side of the planet texts you something of the sort, but then, someone who knows you in person knows your face and how you behave says it. It was like my brain was letting me feel things I had never before. Something ressembling... a whole acceptance.
“Hey, you're welcome. I believe in you” I said.
Later on, I wondered why I behaved like that. I didn’t learn from my family or my goal-oriented culture. It was from the lackness of it all that I created something new in myself. A born of an apposite, due to a hole in myself and yet… positive. Or that was what my brain was making me feel.
Eventually, we became close, almost like a brother and sister. That’s when I confided to her my anxieties, of rejection and socialization.
“So, I listened to this TED talk which says that profound human relationships are very important to be happy. So here I am, trying to be a human being” I concluded, triumphantly.
“Uh, I think I can help you with that! Do you want to come with me to the mall on Saturday and meet my friends?”
“Sure thing!” I texted absolutely terrified, but I had some time to prepare mentally for it.
When the day came, I picked her up and went to our destination. It was not what I expected. People were just hanging out in the parking lot of the mall. The big building was beside the Maracaibo Lake, so it had quite a view, and some patches of grass people could lie on. Everyone knew Yen, but no one knew me.
At first, I went like a tail behind her and bared through the presentations. I could hear my heart pounding below my brilliant smile and the thoughts swirling in my mind, like a tornado of glass but still, I pushed through.
“Hey, my name is Tim. Nice knowing ya” I said once.
“Nice to meet you, I am Tim” I repeated.
Then, I did my not-so-smart move. I bought some candy for people to get some favor. No one seemed to mind.
After a while, I noticed I was being too reliant on Yen, so I went my way around exploring the strange tribe of people just hanging on and about in different clusters. I tried to look at it as some sort of anthropological exploration. I simply approached and listened, waiting for a chance to add something in. Looking back, I wasn’t doing that bad, but I was over-conscious of myself, and overthinking always hurts.
In the end, I felt like I just hung around but couldn’t build a meaningful connection.
“That’s how you start…” I said to myself, trying to deal hopelessly with the thoughts screaming how lame I was.
In the end, the afternoon came. The sky was becoming crimson and the sun was hiding beneath the moving, green sheet of the lake. Time to go home… have a good rest from people.
“How do you feel?” Yen asked, noticing my silence while driving.
“Well… I feel like the heart is going to burst out of me” I confessed, laughing a bit.
She smiled and I felt embarrassed for being so frail. Men aren’t raised to be frail. And yet, I turned out to be prey to many fears.
“You know… I am proud of you” She finally said.
“Really…?” I couldn’t help but confirm. It was an odd thing to hear.
“Yeah, really. I was expecting you to be on my tail all day but you just took it alone like a champ. You should be proud of yourself”
Woah!... my pounding heart expanded, like in The Grinch movie. But of course, I didn’t want to show the degree of my emotional reaction.
“Thanks…”
“Yah.”
The rest of the trip we joked around about the people there until I got her home. After that, I was alone with my racing heartbeat. I felt rusted inside but encouraged by her kind words. I could have never talked about my family about my mental illnesses because they would just dismiss it as laziness or even worse, call it the product of a sin of some sort, so this was new to me, at least in person.
I felt thankful for that TED talk and the Harvard study which convinced me to face my fears and find such a good friend.
Eventually, I kept going with her to the mall on Saturdays to face my anxiety and meet new people. New friendships sprung from that, which I cherish to this very day.
Ah, and so you know. It did work for me.
I was happier because I had someone I could trust my feelings beside me.
