“She’s so high on herself.”
That’s what they used to whisper about me in middle school.
The message was clear: shrink or be excluded. So I shrunk.
The story of my childhood is that I dimmed my light to fit in.
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I feel like I’ve come so far in terms of undimming my light and stepping more into my power, but it’s the voices around me that encourage and remind me that keep me going.
If you’ve had a similar experience, I’d love to hear your thoughts and perspective.
Question for you: If you’ve managed to step into your power even in a small way, what advice would you give to others trying to do the same?
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Transcript: Entering My Diva Era
So I've recently decided I am entering my diva era. This is inspired by Dolly Parton, and I've always loved her, but I have a newfound appreciation for her, and it's in this video clip where she says, "I know who I am. I love who I am. I love what I do in the world. I love my life. I'm confident in myself."
And I was just listening to her thinking, those are words that women don't say, and she's got so much heart that the way that she says them doesn't at all sound offensive or like she's high on herself. I'm going to come back to that phrase, “she's high on herself,” later in my own story. But it was just so beautiful because she was like, "I've got this gift, and I want to share it with the world."
And so I think that she really inspired me recently to step into what I'm calling my diva era. And even saying those words feels so cringy, right? Because you know me, I'm the farthest in the world from a diva.
I think, in my opinion, diva has an implication of being sort of selfish, and what does it imply? Uh, thinking you're better than other people. That's really the thing, right? Thinking you're better than other people. And so I think that there's always been this fear that people would think I was better than other people, or that I would think I was better than other people. Like, God forbid.
And so the reason I'm using the word diva is intentional, because it's provocative and uncomfortable for me, and the gist of it, the intention behind it, is to say: I think the world is better with more of me in it, rather than less of me in it.
I think that I'm confident in who I am, that I'm a person who spreads a lot of love and has a lot of thoughts and has a lot of creativity, and holding myself back or dimming my light is not only not good for me, but it's not good for others.
And so how can I push myself out of the way that I was as a kid (which, again, I'm going to get to), which was to dim my light, and to say, no, it's super uncomfortable for me to say: the world should have more of me in it, not less.
So I mentioned that we would come back to high on myself and dimming my light. And you know, I thought recently about where that came from. Who taught me that? Where was I taught that I should be less of myself in the world?
And I want all of you to really think back, and it's probably not hard to find or place this moment when probably other girls were mean to you, and they said something to you, or they said something to you many times, and you were like, oh, I better change, or I'm not gonna have any friends.
And what the girl said to me (was to my face, but also a lot behind my back) was, "She's so high on herself. She's so high on herself."
I was a dancer, so I had posture, you know? I had the ballerina posture, which is, you know, some people could see it as arrogant or superior or aloof. I was also shy. I was also shy, so the combination of shy and good posture definitely reads as aloof, arrogant, high on herself.
And so when I heard, "Wow, she's so high on herself," I was like, oh, I don't want to be outcast. Like, no girl in middle school wants to be cast out of the group. That’s like death. So I was like, oh, I know. I’ll make myself smaller. If I'm too high, I'll go lower. I'll be more humble.
And so I think I am genuinely humble. But I think this trait of overly humble, this extreme humility, was from that. It was like, how do I protect myself from being cast out of the group? If people already think I'm high on myself, let me be super helpful, super humble, and let me downplay myself, downplay my talents, downplay my gifts, so that I'm not threatening.
So I wonder if you have a story like that, of a way that you, at a moment where belonging was the only thing that mattered, dimmed your light in order to not be threatening. Because confidence is threatening, especially to those who are struggling with it.
Not throwing any shade, you know, but if you're struggling with confidence, and you see someone who's so confident, it just mirrors back at you and makes your lack of confidence feel even more painful.
So I've really worked a lot at this, and I've changed a lot of this, and I, like Dolly (maybe not quite to the extent of Dolly), was like, "I know who I am. I like who I am. I think the world is a better place with me in it."
