FEAR(ce)

Do you feel scared?

Only the good die young.

I have been joking for years that I want this Billy Joel song played at my funeral.

I guess I have been imagining that it will be somewhat ironic – that I will live to a ripe old age and therefore…well, you get it.

I started this blog a long while back. “Started” being a very generous description of the 2 sentences I had written down. But as with most of my blogs there is a lot of thought that goes on behind the scenes. What ends up being a few paragraphs is often hours of thoughts, ideas and prose amalgamating into the actual blog I publish.

Not that it has to be perfect – as a dear friend has set out to remind us, we are to be #FearlessNotFlawless¹ – but I like to really wrap my head around an idea and see it from all angles and then see if I can take some additional cues from what is going on around me.

I decided to come back to this one, following a comment on my last post: If not now, when? About fear being a factor that often prevents us from taking that leap of faith.

When I think about it – I started the blog on the topic of fear following a health scare. And fear might have truly been preventing me from actually diving into the subject matter.

So, the document of 2 lines has sat untouched on my desk top for over a year.

So here I am back to the drawing board (or computer), the scare has subsided and I am tackling the subject from a new perspective.

Fear is one of those things you can’t really escape – it comes at us from all angles, often unannounced and unrelenting.

Fear of pain and dying.

Fear of defeat and failure.

Fear of rejection and shame.

Our reaction to fear is also multifaceted.

Fight or flight?

Status quo or the unknown?

Embrace or avoid?

Fear can also freeze us in place, making growth and change impossible, depriving us of our sense of purpose and meaning.

It’s normal to be afraid of what’s around the corner when we can’t see clearly where the path is taking us…

But the fear of being frozen in place and having to live with thoughts of “what if” and “could have been” is much scarier than “better luck next time”. Having gone after that goal…even if it was a pipe dream, will be a force of change.

At least you dreamed.

At least you tried.

And you are now richer for the experience.

And braver than you thought.

“Feel the fear and do it anyway”²… as always with Grit&Grace.

1. Samantha (Blackhurst) Polovina @Mar2MeSa ↩︎
2. Susan Jeffers ↩︎