A good chunk of my life has been lived anonymously. Sometimes it was voluntarily, other times not. I was and sometimes still am shy and a bit introverted. It was always very hard for me to make friends.

As such, I didn’t always feel heard. I was acknowledged a lot; I was usually titled “Student of the Week” in elementary school, but I was never known as anything more than “the good kid.” While this did have its perks, it still would have been nice to have a face along with that name.

This carried itself onto middle school. Not many friends, and even with the few that I did, I felt more like a sidekick than a friend. If I had anything to say, it wasn’t taken very seriously and if it was, I wasn’t handed much credit.

This probably contributed to putting myself in a bubble a lot. I thought “why bother to speak my mind if no one will listen?” At that point, I was comfortable being anonymous. I was afraid to speak up, rather having someone else do it for me. In all honestly, sometimes it’s still something I struggle with.

I think compared to those days in middle school and early high school, I have improved a lot. I’ve met a bunch of people that helped me grow as a student, professional and as a person. I’m much more social around people, and I think I can comfortably say that I have a voice that has been heard.