Pictures Only Prove You Can't Convince

So let me vent about this:  After someone who meant a lot to me leaves my life, and they go and put all of these pictures of themselves doing fun things up on Facebook, I always think, "Oh goody for you.  Look at the great time you are having...without me.  Look how happy you are...without me.  I don't need you either!"  Only slight sarcasm.  But I just don't take pictures of myself having a great time and put them up on FB.  Partly becuase I never remember to take pictures until AFTER the fact.  And partly because my idea of a great time (during my initial recovery stage, you know, post-loss) is doing crafts, or baking, or taking leisurely walks, or reading my favorite books, or practicing my musical talents...and how would that look if I just took a bunch of pictures of myself doing all these kind of humdrum things?  Wacky.  That's how it would look.  And also sad and desperate.  And no one likes to be around depressed people who are just dying for someone to validate them.  So I validate myself!  And a good (although probably catty) way for me to do that is to say to those people (in my head, of course) "'Pictures only prove you can't convince.'  And if you have to post bunches of pictures of yourself doing all these great things, then you are insecure with where you are at.  Me?  I am so stable, secure, and fine with where I'm at in my life, that I don't even feel the need to publicly document it.  Eat your heart out."  Isn't this silly and juvenille?  And also not true?

I admit it!  Here on this silly blog, this silly wall of virtual graffiti as it was once insensitively termed, I admit that I want to have pictures of myself doing fun things with really cool people.  But more than pictures, I want the EXPERIENCES.  And getting to a point where I feel confident enough to seek out those experiences is a really tough endeavor.  When people leave me, I feel sad, and I always question my worth as a person, thinking "I must be very easy to leave behind.  People are never sad to leave me."  Of course, this is a fallacy.  I mean, come on, the Extrovert cried with me when we said goodbye for the last time.  Crying is a big deal for guys, and I felt like he loved me just as much as I loved him.  It was difficult for both of us.  So I obviously need to stop catastrophizing and just tell myself that I have worth.  Because I do.  But just trying to build my self-esteem back up is quite a process, is the point.  And that's the stage that I'm in right now - finding my self-confidence again and making it work for me.  And good riddance to all of those people who left me behind without a second thought.  They don't deserve me.


This post's title comes from this song:
Inches and Falling by the Format