Anxiety Mosquitos

Growing up, I was the quiet kid. Still am, in fact. I've learned how to express myself when I feel sufficiently motivated only after decades of life experience. But I'm still more likely to do it in the impersonal forum of social media than in real life. And although I overanalyze my words before posting them, I am always racked with shame and self-doubt after the fact. And I still can't decide whether my fears are founded - that maybe I have a rude and argumentative personality, and that I'm better off keeping my mouth shut, and that maybe that's why God cursed me with anxiety in the first place - or if it's just my social anxiety talking. Because I know the value of speaking up, from years of experience not being able to. And I want my voice to be counted among the others (many of which are not half as worthwhile as mine would be even if my worst fears were founded, yet nothing shuts them up because they don't have anxiety or very much self-awareness). I know it deserves to be. I try not to be rude, but I am sensitive - far more than I like. And if I'm argumentative, it's because I see the many ways this world is designed to cause people to suffer, and I want it to change, and sometimes it's the people themselves that are contributing to the propagation of their own suffering (or carelessly hurting others to make themselves feel better). I can't just happily kill time talking about the things I like in the world, because I'm constantly thinking about obstacles in the way of my happiness. I want to believe I'm a good person. But it's hard when a voice inside my head is constantly telling me that I suck. And as much as I wish I could just write it off, there's that other voice behind that one warning me that it might just be my conscience, and that if I shut it off, I would certainly become the bad person I'm trying so hard not to be. And so the cycle continues.