Confidence.  Just typing the word feels a little wrong unless I set the type in bold letters.  Confidence.  There, that’s better, a least better on the outside.  Perhaps an all caps CONFIDENCE, is better still.  I don’t know.  Seems empty. It’s like trying to cover over a small fragile inner frame with false fortissimo.  This was me most of my life.

Truthfully, I lacked confidence in myself for most of my life.  And that was mostly because I didn’t know who I was.  Confused and ashamed, I hid myself away.  I’ve been hidden most of my life.  I had nothing of me to show, and what little I actually had, I didn’t like.  I was alone and unseen.

Do you ever come home and feel that need to turn the TV on immediately?  Get in the car, and crank the radio up?  How about playing on your phone in the doctor’s office.  Ever wonder why the silence seems to kill you?

I would travel for work quite often, and the TV was a comfort.  Like someone else was there, but it was just CONFIDENCE that I would be ok being alone.  I wasn’t.

So here is my first story.  I’ll try to be brief.  I was in college with a summer internship in South Georgia at a paper mill.  I had totaled my first car right after replacing the transmission, and with little money left over, I bought a red(ish) Pontiac Sunbird.  A couple of problems though.  When it came time to travel to south Georgia, my A/C went out, and so did my radio.  The car had flooded on a torrentially rainy day, so the carpet had to be cut out to prevent mold.  The fabric on the roof sagged so I pinned it up as best I could with thumbtacks.

I made the decision to travel back and forth each weekend from South Georgia to Atlanta, and back on sunday, each and every week over the summer.  6 or so hours each way.  Summer.  No A/C.  No radio.  Just me and me.  Something interesting happened on those long hot summer drives.  Yes, the humidity was awful, but I learned that the company was not so bad.

Oddly, in the forced silence, I became more and more ok with myself.  I was able to finally sit and spend time with myself and get to know me.  I hadn’t talked to me much and I was a little apprehensive at first.  Weekend after weekend, drive after drive, I started to like me.  Confidence.  I started to be confidant with who I was…who I am.

I was forced to be still and practice the art of simply nothing.  Turns out, for me at least, the gift of nothing gave me wonderful surprise.  Confidence.