Am I a Risk - Addict?

I know, I know - what you people are thinking..... Just who the heck is this guy to talk aout risk. I'm not a soldier or a fire-fighter or a member of one of the elite crime fighting organisations... Being an oridnary, everyday citizen my oppurtunities for taking significant enough (life threatening risks) are limited enough. But ever since I graduated from being a gawky teenager to a normal adult the thing that every teenager fears so - social ostracism has still stayed with me - so much so that wherever i go, I still strive to be the heart and soul of the party or turn into an invisible speck on the wall - either/or. Which makes me wonder why I take such risks in public places....Is it the Adrenalin Rush? the incredibly heady feeling of plunging into the unknown with the possibility of public humiliation looming large? I just cant explain the Kick I get....

Like today for instance...As i have informed my dedicated readers before I'm wary of public speaking - (being incredibly Shy) - my knees still knock together whenever I get up to make a speech or discuss a point which I have been made to do frequently during my PG days - during all those seminars and symposiums. So today I was in this big Symposium- a big Hall - filled with Gynecologists - all ladies except for a single gent -yours truly - discussing a topic as vague as Gestational Diabetes - and I Heedlessly- either incredibly bravely/incredibly stupidly - got up to discuss a complicated point with the key note speaker - a legend in her field. There was an incredible hush over the audience as everyone craned around to observe the interloper with the temerity to question "The great one". My well grounded knowledge of basics enabled me to carry my point and to show them that outsiders can sometimes have an unique perspective and collective head nodding is for sheep - not intelligent people- science requires questioning regardless of reputation. I think I have branded myself as an Iconoclast in their minds.

Anyway to come back to me. Why do I do It? Why do I take the incredible risk of being laughed at? Of being Humiliated and chased out in front of all those girls? Was I just showing off? Am I a showman at heart or was it the thrill of catching someone wrong and proving my point? Am I a Risk -Junkie? An accident waiting to happen? I don't have the answers... I just felt the endorphin kick..like I'd been on a roller coaster - or the best girl in class comes up to me to ask for my notes... Go Figure...