Through eight episodes of Survivor 45, we’ve gotten a strategically dialed-in Drew Basile. But, in a heartfelt deleted scene, Drew opened up about his social insecurities — a side we had yet to see from the 23-year-old grad student.

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With his “Reba 4” alliance and connection to Emily Flippen, Drew is in a clear power position after 16 days of his Fijian marooning. He’s been on the right side of the numbers at every Tribal Council he’s attended, and considering his closest ally Austin Li Coon is armed with two Hidden Immunity Idols while Drew has the “Safety Without Power” advantage, he’s sitting in perhaps the best spot of the nine castaways.

Although he’s shown himself to be strategically savvy, it’s seemingly his social ties that elevated him to where he’s at.

The deleted scene, released after November 16’s episode, began on night 14, hours after Kaleb Gebrewold and Sifu Alsup were voted out. The cast was cuddled up and sleeping together under the shelter, but they were awoken by Drew’s sleep-talking.

Then, the next day, the castaways brought up his late-night ramblings — something that was a regular occurrence — and they all laughed together. Drew then sat down for his confessional and that’s when he opened up about his longstanding social insecurities.

“Everyone’s laughing. I get it, but the insecurity eats at me because I’m a pretty sensitive guy. Honestly, all my life I’ve felt socially aloof. Like, I’ve never felt like one of the group, and that group could be anything — I’ve just always felt outside of it. And there have been points in my life where I’ve felt like if somebody liked me, it was because I was lying to them like I was misrepresenting myself, that I had tricked them in some way and they didn’t know who I was.”

Drew said that he brought that sort of outlook to the island. “Survivor is a game that will stoke that imposter syndrome that you have,” he continued.

But, being the analytical mind that he was, Drew said that judging by the “data” he had accumulated (his connections with people and his placement in the game’s social hierarchy), he was “not a burden” to his allies. “People out here really do value my presence,” Drew said.

He then called back to the sleep-talking, and said he understood that he was perhaps viewed as a “strange character” — but, it didn’t matter. The evidence had shown he was excelling socially.

“My heart says that I’m still an outsider. But, I know, just common sense, just like get my head out of my butt, I must be doing okay out here socially. So, I guess people must like me, that I must have more than allies out here. I must have some friends out here, and when I can bring myself to believe in that, it feels really good.”

Check out the deleted scene below:

Heading into episode 9, Drew has a one-in-nine chance of walking away with the $1 million check and title of “Sole Survivor.” And it could be his social ties that carry him to the end game — we’ll have to see!