My Greatest Fear
You come running as I crash into one of your windows again. The glass breaks instantly, sending shards of it all over your bedroom, covering the perfectly made bed and scattering around the floor.
But at this point, you don’t really think much about it. Besides, you have magic to clean it all up, putting everything back into order as if nothing happens. It’s a nice power to have isn’t it; magic.
I apologize for what seems like the billionth time to you, and you respond with a glare but then a friendly chuckle saying that no harm was done. I’m surprisingly fine despite the severity of the impact, the lone exception being a couple of small cuts here and there, nothing that a day of healing won’t fix. They don’t call me the fastest in Equestria for nothing right?
But then you make a joke to me, saying that the Wonderbolts won’t take me if I continue to be so careless and crash so much.
Ouch.
You may have laughed while saying that, and I guess I’m supposed to assume that you’re just playing around and poking me in the ribs, a little tease to be exact.
But it hurts.
It hurts much more than you think.
And the thing is, it’s not just you doing it either, all of you think that you can just freely joke around with me like that. I’m supposed to be this indestructible pony which words can impact, apparently I have a rock solid emotional wall which can’t be broken. To be fair, I didn’t know I possessed this either.
What you might like to know, is that every one of those little “playful” insults and jabs you throw at me, well, each one is a stone being flung into that supposed wall, and each one makes a dent. Some of these dents layer upon one another, and eventually this wall starts to form cracks, cracks that spread like wildfire if not repaired with time.
The Wonderbolts is my dream, it is something that I have to strive for, because it is the bane of my existence at this point.
I have, no, I need to prove to myself that I am good enough to make their squad. I have to prove to myself that the title of best flyer in Equestria isn’t merely a title I place upon myself, but a well-known fact. Without this, well, all my boasting, all my achievements mean nothing.
And without this, where does this leave me?
I become a normal Pegasus, and who liked that? Normal is boring, and I don’t do boring. I mean sure, I’m still the loyalty Element of Harmony, but in reality loyalty isn’t all too special. I just find it to be the right way to live, and I like to do the right thing… most of the time. Besides, all of you girls are just as loyal as me. Heck, I’m saying that I’m as loyal as I claim to be, yet I’m willing to leave the instant the Wonderbolts accept me.
And at this point, I don’t just want them to accept me, I need it. My entire life has been dedicated to practicing tricks and stunts, to improving my flying ability to the levels that they strive for in their squad. I like to think I’ve reached that level, but the rejections I have gotten time and time again make it loud and clear that I haven’t yet gotten to their level.
So those comments, even if you’re unable to notice, damage me more than you know.
I swear, I have trained and worked my tail off day in and day out, and every single year I reapply only to receive the same deflating envelope with the same banal writing saying that I just missed the cut, or something of the sort. And these letters, while your comments may be like stones, are like boulders being hurled right into the largest crack in the wall.
They make a hell of an impact, let me tell you that.
At this point, I’ve become so adaptive at hiding my emotions, that you all love to assume that I’m tough and have a shell which doesn't allow me to experience a high amount of sadness or some other sort of emotion.
And to respond to this, well, you’re all wrong. You’re all so very, very wrong.
I’ll be the first one to say it, I don’t like to experience these emotions, and I’ll admit that I lie and say that they are “uncool,” therefore I have no use for them.
But truly, I don’t know how to express just how I feel.
I cried enough when I was younger, and soon I just stopped altogether. The tears eventually stopped coming, because I started making that armored shell, the one that doesn't let in emotion. My childhood might have something to do with that, but the less I think about that time the better.
There are times where I mope in my home, all alone, with nobody to vent to about how crappy a day I’ve had, or how angry I am about something. And to an extent, it’s my fault for not speaking up about it and asking for help, or even seeing somebody about this, as much as I would resist the possibility.
But I haven’t.
Over time, it has built up inside me. This happens to be the water hidden behind the wall.
Very few ponies in my life know about what is behind the wall, the near toxic mixture of emotions I keep locked up behind this weakened wall, which continues to lose its strength with each passing day.
Sometimes I think about it, although I try to avoid it and just smile, as Pinkie would say.
But I can’t help but wonder if one day the wall will finally falter, and with it will be the spilling out of all this pent up emotion.
I’ve seen the damage a massive flood can have on a place, look at how long it took to rebuild Las Pegasus after the main dam to their water supply broke. It took the citizens years to finally get back to a sense of normalcy. The thing that makes it different is that we assume they are to a state of normalcy. For all we know, there might be lasting effects that disaster had on them, to the point where some ponies might never be the same again.
And this is where I come to a crossroads.
My image is something I consider extremely important to me. I love to be seen as the toughest member out of the six of us, the daredevil who won’t back down from any challenge no matter how big or how small.
But the day the wall breaks, well, my image is gone after not. Nobody will ever see me in the same light if I let all those emotions out that I have pent up. Heck, I have no idea what will happen when it does, if it does eventually happen.
I think it will.
Just imagine, a tough, brazen pony becoming a hysterical emotional wreck, a shell of her former self. Even if you would say she’s still the same pony, you’d be probably lying to yourself when you say you’d still view her exactly the same.
So while I like to believe that all my friends would be right by my side when this happens, I can’t guarantee that their image of me will stay, even for Fluttershy, who've I've known for as long as I can remember.
But there is another option, an option which would have a chance at not only repairing the wall, but also getting rid of the toxic mess behind it. With no worry of what’s behind said wall, what is there to worry about.
I could very well admit how I feel to all my friends and seek out help. But I’m afraid to do it, as much as I know it will help me in the long run. Years have gone by now, and there have been times where I think about it in depth, and even begin to plan out a course of action onto what I would want to do.
Never have I even made it to step one of any of these plans.
Part of it is my image, as I find it weak to admit my own flaws, even if many believe the opposite is true in many cases.
But the last time I opened myself up, it ended badly. I’m going to leave it there.
I wish I could tell all of you this, so that you could truly understand the way I feel about things.
I wish you could know that sometimes your words hurt me, much worse that you might believe. Some of the teasing eats me alive on the inside, and that I do find difficultly sometimes in grinning like nothing is wrong and taking it.
But there isn't any blame I could give any of you, because none of you really know any better. If anything, I should blame myself most for not letting anypony know truly how I work, and how I feel about everything. Things would be much better if you all had some insight.
To look back on it, I may call myself strong, tough, and brazen for being able to face any demon, any challenge, any danger head on and persevere. And in a sense, many of you might still agree with this as a proper definition for myself.
But in reality, the one challenge that I fail to tackle, that I fail to realize just how important it really is, is enough to dwarf out all the times I’ve been the strong member of the group. It dwarfs out my accomplishments. It dwarfs out all the accomplishments I’ve ever had, and even dwarfs my dreams to an extent.
It is because of this one fear.
This is fear that seems so simple, yet so complex to the point where I sometimes never know how to quite understand it, even if it seems like I do.
I, Rainbow Dash, suffer from autophobia.
I am afraid of myself.
