Something I am really bad at is existing and allowing myself to take up space. At any given moment I am worrying about how someone may be perceiving me or that they are mad at me or disappointed. Did I make a mistake that I am unaware of?

All my life I have been petrified of making a mistake. My mom says she doesn’t know why…I do, but I’ll save that for therapy.

Recently, I have been very aware of myself and conscious of the way I am always thinking about how others are perceiving me. I am also painfully aware of every possible “mistake” I am making at any given moment. I wish I was blissfully unaware of myself sometimes. I wish I could go through life without the constant anxiety that I am doing something wrong or that someone is unhappy with me. Never have I been able to do that. The constant anxiety filling my mind with questions like, “should I have done that?” “Was that the right thing?” “Should I have done that differently?” Or statements like, “I made a mistake now I have to confess.” Or, “I’m going to get into trouble.” When in reality I am an almost 30 year old adult who can make their own choices and does not have any immediate authority governing my life or my decisions.

Part of my deconstruction journey as I continue to distance myself from my religious upbringing, is figuring out what my inner voice actually sounds like and learning to actually trust it. I have been officially out of religion for almost 10 years but after 20 years of indoctrination, some thing’s are hard to change.

This is one of the things I have a hard time knowing how to change. Do I replace those thoughts with positive ones like, “it’s okay you made the right decision for you.” Or “no one is mad at you.” “I am free to make any decision I want.” From experience simply replacing those questions does not replace the anxiety or the doubt. Or the constant rumination on the possibility I did something “wrong.” So far the only thing that has seemed to work is validation from an outside source that I am in fact not making a mistake or doing anything wrong.

But, I want to able to ease that doubt and anxiety myself. I don’t want to have to rely on others to validate myself and my feelings. I want to trust myself and that inner voice I have been learning to listen to and actually believe that I am a good person and that I am not always making a mistake or doing something wrong.

Mistakes are simply that…mistakes. It is not the end of the world. I am not ruining anything for myself or others. And people make mistakes all the time. I am a person. I am free to make decisions. I am free to make mistakes.