Dear Doubtful,
Self-doubt is the kind that picks up every available bit of doubt and glues it to itself, growing ever larger like a cartoon snowball (yes, I agree; real snow hardly sticks at all- another great childhood myth shot to hell and back). This wonderful ball of horrors and self-induced disaster is the stuff that nightmares are made of, and it has no limit on how large and all-encompassing it can grow. It's also, and this such a shock, completely, absolutely invisible to others. This giant monkey is only our own, and even if others catch a glimpse of this King Kong, they don't believe it could actually be a problem for you, I mean, you? Come on, no way!? Sensitive self-doubters, at this point, will take whatever it is that you may have exposed in your own self-doubt, and quickly pile it on to their own. Like this:
Self-doubter X: Well, I just hope my report was what they wanted... (wistfully, uncertainly, speaking of a task they completed yesterday).
Self-doubter Y: What?? Your reports are the best! You are so good at them- I wish I could do half as well! (reassuringly, confidently, even as they mentally consider the single report of their lives, filed 6 years ago, for a job that they were laid off from, at a company which imploded two months later in a scandal that had nothing to do their report at all).
Okay, now, here's the real mind-bending part: See all that love, care, and detail I have used to describe self-doubt? What about that, eh? What if I love my self-doubt too much to rid myself of it? What if I really am addicted to my self-doubt? What if my affection for my self-doubt is all that the whole thing is anyway? It never occurred to me. Until I heard this song of the day.
Yours,
possibly,
maybe,
and self-doubtfully,
