Fuck the “What if…”s
We’ve all been there.
What if I had gone over there and talked to that hot guy who’s probably totally out of my league? What if he wished that I would do just that because he’s too scared to himself?
What if I called that bitch out on all the shit she puts me through at work? What if standing up to the loud-mouthed bitch made her respect me?
What if I say fuck it and post all my most embarrassing/painful/brutally honest/dumbass moments on a blog, no matter how incriminating it may make me or how judgmental others may be about my choices? What if countless readers regularly thank me for writing about all the things we think and do as our most raw selves, but never talk about?
What if I had broken up with him two years ago instead of two months ago? What if I could have been happier at this point in my life?
What if I tell my boss that I think there’s a better way to do something (and nevermind that I’m a twentysomething peon)? What if I end up saving my boss’s ass from HIS boss?
What if I told my mother what I really think instead of what I feel I should be thinking? What if she told me I should have told her all this in the first place?
What if I had the ovaries to go up to the most powerful VP in my company and tell him I wanted to transfer into his department, even though I’ve only been working there a few months and I would be the youngest person (and one of only two women) on the team?
What if it worked. What if it fucking worked.
You never know unless you put your ass on the line and give it a try. Sure it’s easier when you don’t have anything to lose. What’s the worst that can happen if you go talk to that hot guy in the cereal aisle? He says he has a girlfriend? He says he’s gay? He says no? So fucking what. Now you know and you won’t be wondering what if… Isn’t it worth the possible “no” for the chance that it goes even better than you hoped?
Now don’t get me wrong. I’m not intending to stand up on my 6″ high soapbox and preach to my tiny realm in the blogosphere. If you’ve read more than six posts here hopefully you’ve seen that I am the first to admit when I fuck up, which happens plenty. But I’m also the first to brag. I mean, fuck yeah I’m going to brag because I had to fuck up three times before getting somewhere worth bragging about.
The older I get the less hesitant I am to make an ass of myself. Come on, half my stories are me bragging about making an ass of myself–bragging because I had the ovaries to take a chance, no matter how small or potentially significant. I keep doing it because I know that given simple odds (and bonus for talent/intelligence/charm/nice ass, as appropriate) there’s going to be a decent success rate.
What am I getting at? Well there was the earlier allusion to the break up, but what prompted this post was that I applied for a new position within my company. I went into the interview as a long shot. When I first sat down the VP started to tell me that they hardly ever accept an existing employee in the department. I didn’t let him get very far in his piss-parade: I acknowledged his concerns and reasoning about the department being highly competitive and then addressed why I was confident that I was a very strong contender for the position. (Yes, I had taken notes and rehearsed what I was going to say.) I got an eyebrow raise there. THAT is the key. The eyebrow raise. It means you piqued his interest, if for no other reason than having the ovaries to go after what you want, however far the long shot. After the eyebrow raise I really started to shine and much later left the interview feeling confident and optimistic.
And proud. Even if I don’t get the position, I’m proud of myself for trying because now I know. There will be no wondering. I’m already seeing changes at work since yesterday. I already have more responsibility and more clout with the higher-ups. Part of it I suspect is that I feel more confident and my superiors respond to that.
I don’t ever want to be that person who looks back over her life and wonders “what if…” Life is too damn short to waste your time thinking about what could have been.
