Sometimes it’s just easier to laugh at yourself. As long as I have been on this earth, it has taken me eighteen years to learn how to just laugh it off. I have been flustered. I have had my own feet betray me as they let me fall and land flat on my back.
I have eaten the carpet as I’ve face planted on the floor. I have tripped over my words and landed into a stutter. But guess what? I laughed it off. I have learned to laugh at myself because to make it in this world, you’ve got to be able to laugh it off.
When I was younger, I would get so flustered whenever something would happen to me. I would think about whatever happened for the rest of that day, and that embarrassment would eat at me. It became overwhelming as hell to deal with. I was miserable living that way.
There were so many things that I replayed over and over in my head. So, I decided I had to learn to brush it off. And whenever I learned that things became exceptionally easier.
I say things became easier because I learned to take more risks. I learned how to just pick myself back up and laugh it off if I fall. I am not (well, try not to be) afraid of the failure that holds so many of us back because I know I can just brush it off. When you laugh at yourself, no one can ever make a fool of you. Laughing at yourself frees you.
I do still experience the embarrassment. On the outside, I’m laughing, but on the inside, it’s bothering me. I talk myself through it and realize that I can’t let that little stuff get me down. What is the point of worrying about something whenever it doesn’t fix it? It’s useless.
It wastes your time and energy and stresses you out even more. I have to practice this every day; it’s not a confidence that you wake up with. I work at it every day. I work at it every time I slip up and “embarrass” myself.
So, just laugh your way through it. Laugh your way to confidence because, in the end, you will feel so much better. It will feel like a weight lifted off your shoulders. When you are the first to laugh at yourself, everyone else will laugh with you... Not at you.
"If you can't laugh at yourself, life's gonna seem a whole lot longer than you'd like."
