The Real Reason Why I Became Insecure About My Height...

Good morning everybody. You are currently listening to a tall girl's podcast hosted by a tall girl named India. I hope everyone who is tuning in is doing super fantastic. Before I get into this episode, I do want to say, make sure you're following me on my socials at a Tall girls podcast on Instagram, TikTok and pinches, so that you could stay up to date on all of the latest podcast episodes and catch a glimpse of my everyday life. Also, feel free toly me review and let me know how tall you are. I'm genuinely curious. I'm trying to find my height twin Okay, everything is going to be linked in the description. I hope that the New Year it is treating you well. I hope that it is not giving you a run for your money because we're only like a week or two in, a week and a half and one to two weeks in. Okay, we're only one to two weeks in. Hopefully it's not treating you horribly. And a little segue. Has anybody seen that new Godzilla movie Godzilla? It's called Godzilla minus one. Godzilla has been around for a while. I feel like not as long as King Kong's see if you're into like the whole sci fi fantasy action type situation going, I feel like you'll know what I'm talking about. But for some reason, I'm just into movies with these like big creatures, these big creatures that don't exist, like King Kong, Godzilla, and whatever other huge creatures that don't exist are out there. But that movie was two hours long, two hours and like fifteen minutes long. I will say it was shorter than the Hunger Games movie that I wanted to see. The what is it the something with songbirds? I don't know for sure. I really wanted to see the movie. I saw all four of the Hunger Games movies with Catnus and stuff like that, so it's interesting to see that there's a movie about snow, so I kind of I really really want to see that. But it's three hours long, and half the time when I'm able to see the movie, it's at night, like maybe like five six seven. It's three hours long. I don't know if I could do that, but it's out of my TV, so I'm probably just gonna watch it on my TV. But Godzilla was really good, albeit it was in Japanese. They had English subtitles at least, but I was a little scared when things were coming up in the characters, the Japanese characters and they were talking in Japanese. Was like, did I pay for the right movie? But it was really good. So if you're into action and big monsters wrecking things, you should definitely check it out. I definitely recommend it nine point five out of ten. Anyways, today I am sharing my story the reason as to why I was very insecure about my high growing up. I did say that one of my goals and one of my previous episode, one of my goals is to be more vulnerable and be more open with you guys this year, and I figured that kind of sharing my story would help with that. Like, I know, I talk a lot about my experiences with like the bullying and the name calling and this and that and the other, but I feel like it's it's a good time for me now to just get into the nitty gritty of why the real reason why I actually became insecure about my height when I was younger. Yes, I've been bullied, shamed, and ridiculed because I'm taller than my peers, but that's not the real reason why I became insecure about my height. It all started when I began playing sports. Oddly enough, but growing up, I was quite the athlete. I played basketball, I played soccer, I swam, I played tennis, you name it. I probably tried it at least once. And I was pretty good. You know. Once I got my hand eye coordination down and got a little bit more control over my long limbs and started growing into my body, I was actually pretty good, so good that I was really applauded for it, not just by my parents, but also coaches, other family members, my parents' acquaintances, and even strangers on the streets that would walk by. And it made me feel good, feel good to be recognized for it, for my talents. It made me feel good to be accepted in a way. It made me feel like I was accepted by a lot of people, accepted by my friends and family and even random people. I just it just made it made me feel good about myself that people were saying that I was this great person because I was good at these sports. But I don't know, I think, deep down, like sports and being an athlete just wasn't my number one thing. I don't think I really wanted to. I mean, don't get me wrong, I absolutely loved playing it. Like it was great. I met a lot of people, I made a lot of friends, I learned a lot about myself. I grew up healthily, and now I understand the importance of fitness and all of that. But I don't think it's something that I was going to take super, super seriously the older I got. But I think as time went on, people definitely had different plans for me. As I got older, I was made to feel as though my height would be a waste if I didn't play a sport like my this had to be used for something. People would be like, if you don't do this, you'd be wasting your height, or this is a gift given from God and you have to use it, or you have so much potential with that height, to the point where I felt this pressure that if I didn't continue playing this sport, I would let people down. And as a child, as a young person, that was very scary, you know, especially when your mind is still developing and you're still like forming these new relationships with other people and you're growing and developing, so you don't like necessarily have that mindset of oh, I should be doing this for me, not to make you proud or something like that. Like I couldn't differentiate the difference between those two things. So I was very, very scared that if I didn't continue playing, if I didn't continue doing something that I honestly wholeheartedly wasn't into, I would just be a reject at some point, because all I wanted was to be accepted, and if I didn't play a sport, if I wasn't an athlete, then I wouldn't be accepted. It was kind of like the only way to be accepted was to do what other people expected me to do. And with knowing that, I wish that I could go back and tell my younger self that just because I'm tall, I don't have to play a sport. Like I don't have to play basketball, I don't have to play tennis, I don't even have to model. I can be tall and just exists like every other human being. But this idea that, oh, because I'm tall, I have to be an athlete. It was ingrained in me for so many years, and I just want to say, hey, like it's I'm not telling you whether or not you should play a sport. No matter what your head is, tall, short, average, whatever, I'm just saying that you should be doing something that you want to be doing, something that makes you happy, and not to make other people proud and happy for you. Like, yes, ultimately we want to make other people proud of us, but that shouldn't be like a top priority, like, oh, I'm doing this so that these people can't accept me and be proud of me, and so forth and so on. But that idea that I'm doing it to make people proud. It was like so ingrained to me. And then finally, when I was like seventeen or eighteen and I stopped playing, mainly because of the pandemic that hit, like everything was shut down. I just wasn't doing anything. I was scared. I was like, what am I without sports? What am I without being an athlete? Like? Are people still gonna see me a certain way? Are they still gonna treat me the same way they did before when I was an athlete? Are they gonna hate me? Like? I don't know. It just made me feel bad. It's interesting the role that adults play in the insecurities of younger people, Like, yes, my peers would make fun of my height, but There were also a lot of adults that were making me comments about my height and made me feel as though I had this undesirable trait to guys and would tell me that it looks awkward as a tall person if I don't play a sport. And let me tell you, these were grown folks to a ten, eleven, twelve thirteen year old kid for real, And it's like, yeah, like my parents commentaries, but I'm not gonna lie, I low key was a bully because I was taller than everybody else. Yeah, I was a little bit of a bully when I was younger. So I kind of use like my height and my kind of scariness to my advantage. But it's not something that you could really use against adults, you know what I mean. I feel like they're they're more of doing mine tricks rather than physical intimidation, if that makes sense. These things would come from my parents, my parents' acquaintances, my friend's parents, and even strangers. And it's like some of these people don't even know me like that, like why are you telling me that I should be doing this or making comments on my body? I don't even know who you are, and you don't even know who I am. Like what, I just wish that more people really realized how deep the insecurity of its all woman actually is. It's more than just a surface level comments and questions. It's more like being treated and seen differently or a certain way because of a physical attribute that we don't even have control over, some good and some bad. One thing that I definitely would say to my younger self and to anybody else who's also struggling with this, is that you don't need to fit into these expectations and stereotypes that people have set for you and for other people. I'm proud to be tall and be a musician, and be a college student and be a freelancer and all these other things. Like all of my hobbies and my interests are just a small part of me, a small part of who I am. So that kind of helped me to realize that even if I were still an athlete to this day, that's not my whole identity. Like I like how people I don't actually don't like. I don't like how people try to make it seem as though that, like, as a tall person, if you're an athlete, you being an athlete is your identity, Like it's part of your identity, but that's not all of you. And then on top of that, it's not like we could be an athlete forever like that does. That takes a toll on your body. There's a lot of wear and tear on that. Like, yes, you could do it when you're younger, but the older you get, like, there's other things that you're gonna have to move on to because you can't be an athlete for your entire life. And like I said before, I'm not trying to discourage people from being an athlete. If you want to be an athlete, that's amazing, Like you should still go do it, but you should be doing it for you because you like it and you want to do it, not for other people and to make them happy and proud of you. So something that you need to know is that other people's words and expectations do not define you. You define you. Don't even let those things take you down a path that you don't even want to walk on. And I'm gonna leave you with that last. So the main reason why I actually became insecure about my height is because of my whole journey of being an athlete. When I was younger and people making me feel as though I would be nothing if I wasn't an athlete, and that because I'm tall, I should be an athlete and do nothing else and that would be my whole, entire identity. And it just made me feel so scared, like wow, like am I really nothing besides somebody who could play a sport? Like that's actually crazy. So then that would lead me to feel bad about myself, and that's kind of where it all started. So yeah, thank you for tuning in this far and making it to the end. I really appreciate it, and I appreciate you as I always feel free to hit me up on my socials at a Tall Girls podcast and we could talk about our insecurities together. Let me know, let me know, I'm genuinely curious. I am down for a nice chit chatter about our insecurities. Everything is going to be linked in the description, including the link to leave me a review, and I will catch in the next one. Good night and goodbye.