Wordy & Nerdy #4: Feelin’ new sucks (but it doesn’t have to)
If you’re anything like me, you hate feeling “new.”
That feeling of not being immediately good at something… even if you just started that “something” 5 minutes ago.
Maybe that’s being a high achiever
Maybe that’s the way my brain is wired.
Or maybe that’s the nature of perfectionism.
Whatever it is…
I think we can all agree that feeling sucks.
But, despite newness having a pretty high “This Sucks” factor…
None of us can go through life without being new at something.
In the last W&N, I shared my journey from Professional Student to Professional Writer.
(Which is going up on Medium this week, if you missed it.)
Right after I made the leap to Professional Writer, I had to be new at…
Well, everything, really.
I was a total newbie at things like:
- Networking and building a community
- Creating a portfolio and sharing my work
- Marketing myself and my services to clients
- Understanding the government-y business stuff
- All things money-related (i.e. pricing, taxes, etc.)
It sounds like a lot…
Because it is a lot.
It’s hard to be new at everything all at the same time.
And the newness-to-discouragement pipeline is very, very short.
So, what can you do when you’re drowning in newness?
When you have no idea what in the fresh hell is going on?
When you’re feeling vehemently anti sunshine-and-rainbows?
Well, the way I see it, you have two options:
Option 1 is the easy one — you quit.
That looks like:
- Throwing your computer off a cliff
- Assuming fetal position on the couch
- Enjoying your good ol’-fashioned Give Up
Option 2 is the harder one — you ask for help.
That looks like:
- Turning to more experienced folks who know how to do the thing you’re new at
- Building relationships with those folks, drawing inspiration from their success
- Being brave and asking your newly-formed community to give you a hand
As a brand new baby writer, I picked Option 2.
For me, that looked like:
- Learning from other writers on social media
- Having coffee chats with other freelancers
- Joining freelance groups and communities
- Lurking in group/community convos (until I got brave enough to join in)
It was the right pick back then, and it’s the right pick now, too.
Because to me, the best approach to newness is pure, unashamed acceptance.
Adopting a mindset of — as the French say — soo la voo.
Being new isn’t a drawback or a hindrance.
It’s an opportunity to build your own sense of community.
Because being new gets a lot easier if you’re not doing it alone.
Wordy & Nerdy — Feelin’ discombobulated?
This week, we’re combining wordiness and nerdiness in a double feature.
Enter this week’s topic: the word “discombobulated.”
A word that’s fun to spell, and even funner to say.
And, more specifically, an adjective that means characterized by confusion or disorder.
Yet, despite its funness…
One very important question remains:
If you can be discombobulated, can you also be combobulated?
Yeah… sorta.
The word “discombobulate(d)” was born sometime in the 1800s, though to have been made up by “high-society” rich folks who created ridiculous-sounding words for fun.
(I know Bridgerton isn’t Victorian era but shhhhhhh)
But, perhaps distracted by the shininess of their massive Victorian mansions, these OG word nerds failed to invent the antonym for discombobulate.
And apparently, nobody has really given it much thought since then, either.
In his 1989 publication titled “Declining Grammar and Other Essays on the English Vocabulary,” Dennis Baron had this to say about our missing antonym:
“Not all negative words presuppose the existence of a positive, a sign that language and logic do not always go hand in hand.
There is no lost word combobulate from which discombobulate might have been taken.
But speakers of English hate a semantic vacuum, and it is reasonable to suppose that… combobulate has been uttered, or at least thought of, from time to time.” (pp. 127–128)
So, can you be combobulated?
Not according to Merriam-Webster.
But according to Urban Dictionary?
Absolutely fo’ shizzle.
(I’m so sorry I had to.)
More info to discombobulate yourself:
- Blog: “The Etomeelo… Atomolo… Etymolololo… Etymology of “Discombobulate”
- eBook: “Declining Grammar and Other Essays on the English Vocabulary” (1989)
- Blog: “Are you discombobulated?”
Bits & Bobs
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Thanks for reading, and I’ll see ya in 2 weeks.
— Mel
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