Growing Up Un-Good: Don't Be Fooled By the Mask
Why A Mentor Matters & Thank God for Women Friends
(Hello Readers and Subscribers. I’d love to hear from you, and welcome, if you are new here! I am getting close to 200 subscribers! What an honour! I am going with my gut on the many topics that help us be happier, healthier and more connected. I truly feel it took me way too long to figure stuff out, and I hope through my experience and learned knowledge, I can help you feel more confident in your own skin and also help the kids in your life do the same.)
I felt bad. Like, un-good. I felt lonely and ugly and different from everyone. I felt misunderstood and unseen and desperately wanted to be loved.
Why? Because we all want to be loved, don’t we. Why didn’t I feel loved? I am not quite sure. It is likely complex, and I don’t want to place blame.
The need to show up without the veneers, or the veils, is such a key to happiness and contentment. But the confidence to do that… not so easy. It took me years to be able to be comfortable without the masks.
Why? This has perplexed me for decades.
I have many friends who seem to be able to just, be. Just be themselves, face forward, move ahead and damn the consequences and the chatter whispered around them. What is the difference between them and me?
I am not a Psychologist, but my knowledge in psychology and child development and learning theory and the ethic of care keeps pointing me back to caring adults, like mentors, and their effects on how we form our self concept.
A Caring Adult
I had parents who loved me very much. I know that. But what I did not have, is someone to really talk to, to truly listen to me and to offer me wisdom and support. Oftentimes, a mentor role can be filled by a parent, of course, but sometimes other adults can take on this role, too. This is why the research on child development clearly shows that extra caring adults in a child’ life can be very beneficial.
Some research shows that just ONE extra caring adult in a child’s life can make a large impact. These youth are less-likely to suffer from depression and also less-likely to be bullies. Kids who have a mentor-figure in their lives reap other benefits, too:
“This group is also more likely to complete tasks they start, remain calm in the face of challenges, show interest in learning new things, volunteer in the community, engage in physical activities, participate in out-of-school time activities, and be engaged in school.
Additionally, those who have a caring adult outside the home are more likely to talk with their parents about “things that really matter.” These results suggest that mentor-like adults outside the home can be a resource in promoting positive well-being for children and adolescents.”
I believe that because I didn’t have the presence of a mentor in my life as a child, it took me a long time to accept myself.
My friend Carmen says she saw the transformation start when I was going through my divorce at 36. We started calling the pre-divorce Gayle “Old Gayle” and the post-divorce version, “New Gayle”. Carmen helped me stand up for myself, use my voice, take some time for myself and have some fun. I remember clearly the time she took me to a Hot Yoga class. I had never done yoga before and I loved it. In savasana, I cried my eyes out. I realized I had never let myself be still before.
I feel now, there is even another revolution of me. I have been calling her, rather than “New Gayle”: “True Gayle”.
True Gayle took decades to emerge. As True Gayle, I am beginning to ease into my life.
Don’t Take As Long As I Did
Ease.
I would never have used that word to describe how I felt day to day.
I am 60. I don’t want you to take that long. Don’t let yourself take that long to believe that you and your strengths and quirks and skills and ideas matter – and will be welcomed. They will. You will.
For me, I only arrived from my slow, bumpy journey to fit into my own skin, and to be secure enough to relax into myself, just in the past couple of years. I feel like I am running out of time. I feel like I have such a short time to be me.
The years of mask-wearing. I wore many masks, except the proverbial oxygen mask, of course. That was nowhere to be found.
My most often worn masks were “Independent-Woman-Mask”, “Multi-Tasker-Good-At-Everything-Mask”, “Dutiful-Daughter-Mask”, “Agreeable-Wife-Mask”, “No-Problem-I-Can-Do-It-Mask”, “Yes-I-Am-Doing-Great-I-Am-Always-Doing-Great-Mask”.
Even as a preteen and teen, I wore masks.
These masks were ornate, elaborately-detailed, full face masks that fit me perfectly. They fit so well, in fact, that my family, friends and teachers thought they were me.
Young Gayle had many friends, was helpful, played volleyball and softball and loved art. She was a leader and was the captain of the volleyball team, and was the President of the Students’ Council. She was on the Honour Roll every term and she had friends across all the different cliques at school.
But inside, Young Gayle struggled silently.
She was cutting at 12. Cigarette smoking at 11. Pot smoking at 11. She had boyfriends at this young age and did pretty much everything but sleep with them.
Was all of this because of the absence of a mentor? I doubt it. Not all of it.
But I know that if I had had an older adolescent or adult to talk to, and confide in, I know that would have made a difference to me. If I had had someone I trusted to guide me, I think I would have steered away from people and experiences and even beliefs, that made me feel small and unlovable and un-good.
Now, I am excited to be me.
In my adult life, I have had mentors.
My mentors have been women. I did not gain these relationships until after my thirties, for the most part, but through the women in my life, I have gained the confidence and skills to help me relax into being me.
I am slowly becoming convinced that I am armed with the knowledge and beliefs that I need. I am so blessed to have the deep trusted friendships of women who have helped me embrace my quirks and gifts and strengths and slowly gain confidence to share them.
From these women I have learned life lessons that I wish I had learned as a child. As a young woman, these beautiful mentors, these trusted friends (and I include my two adult daughters in this group, too), began to teach me things like: I am strong, I will get through the dark times, and that I deserve love.
They taught me the skills needed so I could let go of things I could not control, and so I could recognize if I was self-sabotaging.
I even learned practical things like how to top and tail peas, what facial toner is, that I can say no sometimes, that we are allowed to have a glass of wine in front of our kids, and watching a movie does not mean I am lazy.
When we can ease into our lives, when the young people in your life can ease into their lives – mask free – celebrating who they are, face to the sun, shoulders back – that is the beginning of the journey.
I want True Gayle to have as much time to be in this world as possible.
Reach Out to A Young Person
Reach out to a young person in your life.
Listen.
Ask.
Listen some more.
The taking of time to share your thoughts about how you began to understand who to trust, how you dealt with fears, how doubts plagued you and how you wrestled with that, the terrible feelings you had when you made mistakes, and what you eventually learned from them…. Those conversations will help them feel less alone, less un-good.
Get comfy, or go for a walk, or sit side by side in the car (that side by side is a great set-up, as there is no direct eye contact and can ease the pressure or lessen the intensity of topics. I often waited for car rides to have deep conversations with my kids, or figure out how the party went last weekend.)
Listen and listen some more.
Life is too short for mask-wearing. Let’s reveal ourselves and revel in that truth. We often cannot do it alone, especially in this era rife with showcasing only perfection.
Have a look around at the kids in your life. Look carefully.
Watch for the ones with eyes-lowered, and maybe the ones who have been called too sensitive. The quiet ones.
Watch too, for the ones who fool most people. The overachieving ones. The ones always smiling. Maybe the ones who are always helpful, uber polite, maybe taking on too much, maybe those ones. The ones wearing the ornate “Sure-I’m- Fine-I’m-Always-Fine-I-Can-Help-I-Always-Help-Mask.”
Reach out. Build trust. Laugh.
Can you show them how your eyes light up when you see them? They need someone to do that. We all do.