Are you sure this is your answer?

This was the pass or fail moment. The determining question: if I got it wrong the test was over. Pack it up, go home, disappointment, big bummer, womp womp womppppppp.

The studying regiment was weeks long. By the end nearly the entire Driver’s Permit handbook was highlighted. I had friends who said “I never even opened that book, it’s all common sense!” but not me. I read it over and over, carried it with me everywhere and knew every piece of information it contained, I could visualize the diagrams and what side of the page they were on. Littered with post-it flags, the already thin booklet was worn on the binding as if it was my favorite book. (It wasn’t.)

I sat at the touchscreen computer plugging in my answer confidently until the dialogue box popped up asking: “Are you sure this is your answer?”

Ummmmmmmm….I was sure. But now I’m not sure. Better reread this question just in case…

11 questions later and I had changed almost every answer when asked “Are you sure this is your answer?” 

And each time after finally saying “YES. This is my answer!”  it told me exactly what the right answer was….and most times it wasn’t my answer.

Well, it was right….at first! But I successfully second guessed my way to a failure. 

I stared at the screen in disbelief for a minute, grabbed my paperwork, got back in the line to the DMV front desk, and quietly waited for my turn in a puddle of embarrassment. I failed. I failed knowing all the answers! Always the passenger, never the driver.

I looked up and over in the waiting area my dad stood craning his head to see me, he caught my eye and held both arms all the way up, waving them with two thumbs up, doing a little happy dance, smiling and laughing. I look directly back, smiling, but shaking my head “No”. 

He winced. He quickly put his arms down, hands in his pockets, and moseyed over to the windows to look out into the great beyond of Sharonville, OH. I know he felt worse than I did probably, especially after the thumbs up dance. 

An adult behind me in line (who definitely saw that whole exchange) asked, “Did you fail?”

“Did you fail?”

“Hah yeah” I said, with that smile so mixed with gratitude and annoyance (with myself) that it would have given the very basic smile emoji a run for its money. 

“That’s okay, a lot of people don’t pass the first time. You can come back in 24 hours to take it.” Then he said some other encouraging words I forget. He was there for his motorcycle license. He passed.

My dad bought me bagels. It wasn’t the end of the world. Sometimes we fail.

But I second guess myself a lot. 

I’m sure there’s a lot to unpack behind that statement--it could be:

• my life long relationship with anxiety/OCD

• Perfectionism oozes from my pores

• my fear of not being “good enough” or enough at all (see previous post)

• the general uncertainty that we live with in a world that is constantly changing

• a lack of self trust? (ah!)

• a lack of or struggle with self confidence? (also ah!)

Most of the time, I’m annoyed with my second guessing. It slows me down. It highlights the fact that I don't know everything and I will never know everything (a fact which I already know, and is already annoying as it is, much less being reminded of it). Second guessing feels like a weakness. It feels like a struggle, an irritant, a frustration. Sometimes it just makes me feel dumb.

All of those feelings are valid and true. It reminds me of something I learned in college: “for every true thing, the equal and opposite is also true”. I think about this concept a lot in a lot of ways. So I’m trying to shift my perspective and consider that second guessing might be a secret strength.

When I second guess myself maybe instead of feeling annoyed, frustrated, slowed down I could see it as an opportunity to look and listen a little more closely. An opportunity to ask myself: is this fear talking or my intuition talking? 

(It is sometimes SO hard to tell the difference. My fear is VERY persuasive, and so am I.)

If it is fear talking--the answer is easy: I acknowledge, and (unless my fear has actual, valid points) I disregard, I remind myself I am capable, I got this, even if I don’t know what I’m doing. We move onward.

The answer is easy, the doing is hard. 

Sometimes I have to run through that process a few times before I can follow through with the action.*

Sometimes I come out the other end feeling confident that I did in fact not mess up everything I’ve ever done, and that this task will not be the end of me. 

Sometimes I go through the process and come out still feeling like I messed up. 

But sometimes we have to do things even though we are scared, and if we mess up then we figure out how to fix it later. Or we figure out how we can do better next time.

We can only do so much in one sitting. 

Our best varies from moment to moment. 

***I will also note that my anxiety/OCD makes this EXCEPTIONALLY CHALLENGING. I have spent more than a minute staring at which spoon to use for my meal as if my fate lies within that decision. So, if you relate to that--I see you. I feel you. You’re very much not alone. In fact I could write a book solely on this topic. I’m working through this (and have been for my whole life), I hope you find the tools you need to do the same.***

Okay! So if it isn’t that I’m scared, then it must be something else? Usually that is my intuition talking. 

Intuition often says:

Is what I’m doing right? 

Is it right for me? 

Is it truly what I want to be doing? 

Is there an alternative that would be better? 

Do I need to pause until I have more clarity? 

Do I need to ask for help? (or better yet, will I ask for help? Can I give myself the grace and permission to ask for help? I don’t know everything!!)

Sometimes you just feel something. For me, when it isn’t fear, it’s my gut saying “Slow down, double check, think for a second or two or ten. Ask questions. Repeat until clarity or urgency prevails.” 

And that isn’t a weakness. In fact, the ability to slow down even for a second in a world where nearly everything is instant is a feat in itself. To look around, to listen, to see--if that’s what second guessing is asking of us every now and then, what a gift it is to second guess!

In fact, the ability to slow down even for a second in a world where nearly everything is instant is a feat in itself.

Sometimes I annoy myself when I say things like “what a gift it is to second guess!” But I honestly do mean it. (We can roll our eyes at me together, it’s fine.)

Likeeeee, how EASY for me to type this. How EASY  for me to think this! How TRICKY it is to live and execute this! The audacity I have towards myself sometimes astounds me.

But hot dog! 

Just thinking through this as a concept has helped inch my perspective towards a better, more effective place. A place in my head that I would rather live in than the place that laments every moment of second guessing.

So tricky, but worth a try. (Like most good and helpful things IMO).

Oh and that driver’s test? I passed the second time around with much less second guessing because though I didn’t know I was doing it--I was acknowledging the fear and sending it on its way. I don’t think I said “I got this.” but I knew I did. Can’t let fear drive the car, ya know? (Shoutout to Elizabeth Gilbert’s Big Magic for that concept!!)

And my dad bought me donuts!

“Bagels when you fail, donuts when you pass.” he said. (Literally a thing he made up in that moment, he doesn’t even remember saying this lol)

Bagels when you fail? Donuts when you pass? Win/win in my book. No need to second guess that.