Outsecurity.

I suppose most people would say I'm a confident person.

It seems to me this confidence isn't permanent. I don't know if insecurity and confidence exist on the same sliding scale, at opposite ends, or on two separate planes. This is, does a person tip from confidence to insecurity to confidence, or do we leap back and forth from one level to the other? All very abstract, sure. I want to work out how and why and where my insecurities arise. So maybe all this cloud-thinking helps.

I've set myself a task. I'm going to list my insecurities, what I'm afraid of. Here:
- being left. Abandoned? No, left.
- being second-best.
- being misinterpreted.
- being unwanted.
- being boring.
- being perceived as stupid.
- not knowing where I stand.
- not being in control.

There are also, of course, the superficial insecurities. I don't have bright white teeth, I do have stretch-marks, I do have a scarred hand from an accident with boiling water when I was young, I don't have a high-earning job, I do have large pores, I am weak in saying no to alcohol and cigarettes (I CAN say no, I just don't do it often enough).

We all know where the body-image stuff comes from and, to be frank, I'm not really terribly bothered by it. It's the Big Fears I'm unsure of. As a kid, for the first few years, I remember hating it when mum left me alone. Give me attention, lots of attention, all the time, don't go away. Mum and I were a team. Us versus dad's Schizophrenia. Eventually but suddenly, mum left dad and, for a couple years, focused inward. Christ, I was pissed at her for leaving me alone, without warning, in the middle of the field, forced to compete as a one-woman team.

Please don't cry me a river. See? I'm worried about being boring, being self-indulgent. I'm trying to figure things out. I'm broke and I can't afford to pay my psychologist twice a month, like I should. So I'm blogging instead.

What are your insecurities? And are they friend or foe?