Be Cool

Last night I was lying awake in bed asking myself what’s cool. Which, when you think about it, is not cool. Not cool at all, I say. Not one bit. But there I was, being me, trying to figure it out. Be cool.

What would that look like? What do I have to do? What do I do with my hands? I stared at the ceiling fan - which needs to be dusted - plotting ways to get that external validation. I need to be cool.

I thought about the specifics of my plan. I’m not going to tell you everything, but it’s a performance. Everything is scripted, words carefully chosen. Then I thought about the platform I’ll be using and how that’s almost exactly the opposite of what tends to work on it. Does different mean it’s not cool? How does the app decide what’s cool?

I reminisced a bit on high school. We used to quietly judge kids who put in too much effort in gym class and call them “try-hards”. I used to be an ugly idiot before I became a beautiful one. I’m offering a sincere apology to anyone I might’ve hurt then with that judgement. Yet another example of a way in which I was not cool.

Worrying about being cool sucks. It doesn’t make you feel good and it doesn’t really get you anywhere. You know what I think is cool now? Believing in yourself. Ignoring the fear of making a mistake. Not letting your concern of how you’ll be perceived prevent you from taking a chance. And you know what you have to do to be able to do that? You have to try, really hard. It takes a lot of work to get comfortable with yourself. But to put in all that effort, and emerge confident, kind, and joyful? To learn to be grateful to be you? And then to decide to share that with the world?! That process, in my opinion, is a sacred transference of energy. And that’s pretty cool…

…I think.

-J.P.