RISKY BUSINESS

You know something I have recently realized I hate more than a lot of other things? Risks. I detest taking risks. Ever since I was little, I avoided them at all costs. I never talked out of turn in class. I never strayed from the strict uniform code growing up in private schools, no matter how badly I wanted to wear socks that didn't come above my ankles. When my friends and I used to make prank phone calls, I was never the one to talk to the poor innocent soul we were harassing. And when I was, I always hung up the phone as soon as the person on the other end answered. Except for the time in eighth grade when my friends and I sang Britney Spears to our principal, and I was the one that had to go into the police station for questioning when she filed a complaint (story for another time...I'm still scarred). Bottom line, I was never a trouble maker. I liked to know what was expected of me, and stick to it. Part of this was because I'm an insane people pleaser, which I'm working on, but the other part was just because I really didn't want to risk getting in trouble.

Even as I got older, when the risks were different than getting in trouble, I still opted out whenever I could. So many times in high school, my anxiety would get the best of me because I didn't want to risk getting stuck in a situation I was uncomfortable in. I wouldn't go to parties or dances because I didn't want to risk it. I didn't go on vacation with friends because "What if something happens?" was as far as my brain would think. I had my safe little bubble, and I liked it in there. Only, come to find out, I hated it in that bubble. I just didn't know it yet.



In all honesty, college was probably the first big risk I took. My parents didn't think I was going to go away. And with good right. Leaving home and going to school in a city of nearly three million people shouldn't have even been on the table. There should have been no way. But I was determined to do it. Up to that point, everything people said I couldn't do, I couldn't do. They weren't being pessimistic, just realistic. But something was telling me I could do this; that, as terrifying and impossible as it seemed, it was manageable. And so, one day after school, I told my mom where I was going to school. No more looking, no more talking, I had decided on DePaul University. She said okay, and we made plans for me to attend in the fall. But from that day until the day I left for school, maybe even a few weeks after I started, I think my parents still had doubts. I never did. I still don't know why I didn't. I have no idea what made me so confident that I wouldn't fail, but I knew I wouldn't. And I didn't. College is the best thing that has ever happened to me. I grew in ways that I couldn't have even dreamed of. The person I was before I left for my freshman year is a shadow of who I am now. I sometimes don't even recognize her.

Except sometimes I do recognize her. Even after such a positive outcome of such an enormous risk, I still HATE taking them. I hate jumping off that cliff. When I get to the bottom, I'm almost always glad I stepped off. But it's the whole free fall down that scares me shitless. The risks are different in this stage of the game, though. School, career, friends, love. The funny thing I've noticed lately is that some of the risks I'm afraid to take are because things seem too good to be true. I feel like I need to run because there is just no way I can possibly be this happy. So I should get out now, before things get really messy and I get hurt. Who thinks like that? I want to get out of an incredible situation because I'm afraid to risk getting hurt? That would be screwing myself over in the largest way possible. Yes, things could go horribly wrong. And friendships could be ruined, or my heart could be broken. But I can't live my life half-assed in order to prevent the possible negative outcomes. Because what if those things don't happen? And things turn out perfectly? How would I ever know that if I didn't take the risk? So I'm going to just start taking those risks. Jumping off that damn cliff, even if I scream the whole way down.