on confidence (with a bunch a teenage angst)

i read somewhere (where, i’ll never tell you. it’s deeply mortifying. just trust me, okay?) that maybe there are different types of confidence. now, i’ve read this particular piece of writing far too many times, and every time i come across that particular paragraph or so, i put it down for a second. the general gist of it is this:

character a has the kind of confidence that makes people dislike her while character b has the kind of confidence that makes boys like her.

character a happens to be my favorite fictional character of all time. (if you even remotely know me, this won’t be hard to figure out.) she’s determined and ambitious and so so talented. character b is almost a foil. this character is beautiful in a straightforward way, popular, pretty. the whole package. character a views herself as the exact opposite.

i am character a here.

(that’s confusing, but what i mean is i feel the same as character a. all cleared up? good.)

i think that my confidence lies in what i want to do and be and where i want to go. it is a very small piece of confidence, so i cherish it. i’ve never been the girl who has a boyfriend. never the girl being crushed upon, always the girl that’s crushed. and whatever, that’s fine. i know have time for all of that in college and my twenties and blah blah blah. i know. i just think it would be nice to be that girl. but whatever. i’m bitter as of late. i blame homecoming and solely homecoming. it is a ploy to get what little confidence i have to plummet. ahhh, high school, i love you dearly.

not.

i’m not looking for a pep talk or anything like that. i’m getting off track. forgive me.

i’d say i have the confidence that makes me want to be really successful and a journalist and win a pulitzer prize. who knows. i don’t. but the point is i want all of that and more. i feel like i’m enclosed with girls who would rather settle, girls who aren’t driven like i seem. i don’t want to be that girl. the thought of becoming that girl gives me nightmares. honestly.

what’s wrong with them? what’s wrong with me? who exactly is in the wrong here? the a girls, me, or the b girls, everyone else? both? neither?

i’m probably paranoid here. but maybe i’m not. my circle of friends feels like it’s becoming smaller and categorized. don’t talk about boys with this person. only talk about boys with that person. don’t annoy this person with your mundane thoughts. they’re too busy for that.

i’m not confident enough to have the gall to new, good friends. i wish that i was right now, but i’m not. sometimes i think i could be–can be–but it’s a slippery slope most days. i’m hannah horvath towards the end of the first season of girls.

any mean thing that someone’s gonna think of to say about me, i’ve already said it to me, about me. probably in the last half hour.

i’m too much; i’m not enough. i’m all over the place all the time. my thoughts are scattered. i can hardly type this blog post without some tangent that no one cares about.

i like being character a and hannah horvath most of the time. but there’s a part, a small part that feels like at any moment it could cave into my whole being, that wants to be character b. i can’t help myself. my nearly 18, not a beauty queen, never been kissed self can’t resist the yells of “you’re not good enough. you’re not pretty enough. you’re pitiful.”

i swear to god, one day, i’m going to find a way to be character a and just a little bit of character b too. just a little, i promise.