Sorry I'm Late, I Didn't Want to Come: One Introvert's Year of Saying Yes

by Jessica Pan

When you’re both waiting in the same line for twenty minutes; when the plane is delayed, you’re stuck at the gate, you’ve already listened to four podcasts, and you’re admiring the shoes of the woman sitting next to you and want to tell her about something you just heard on NPR but feel weird about it; when you want to ask the person eating lunch on a park bench where they got their delicious-smelling curry—maybe just do it. Most people will enjoy it.

I am struck by how saying things out loud, declaring them to people, makes them seem more real. How these once-in-a-lifetime occasions come and then they go. How I do not want to regret not doing the thing—whatever the thing may be—anymore.

I’m learning this is how life works: we nearly die, and ten minutes later we’re throwing tantrums about getting a speeding ticket on our way back from the hospital.

A big part of this year was the desire to be brave enough to do something that felt so contradictory to the kind of person I thought I was.

But self-confidence doesn’t find us: we have to push ourselves to do something hard and live through it, and then confidence will eventually follow. I’d faked confidence and, by doing so, created it. It really did feel like a feat of wizardry.