Happy Halloween to all! This is the season of ghosts and spirits and things that frighten us, yet shadowed with the sense that we can be anything other then ourselves for some trick and treats. Today had me thinking about what scares me, where my fears are, and what they are trying to teach me. One big fear of mine is writing. So I figured, let’s do what scares me today and write a little.
Brene Brown describes anxiety, dread, and fear in her book “Atlas of the Heart” (2021). She notes that, “for anxiety and dread, the threat is in the future. For fear, the threat is in the now…both our anxiety and our fear need to be understood and respected, perhaps even befriended. We need to pull up a chair and sit with them” (p. 12-13). It is a consistent effort to befriend these feelings, and I feel like I’ve gotten better and better at it over the last several years. Note, this is still a work in progress for me.
I’ll never forget when I was training for my first marathon in 2016, and I was dreading race day with my anxiety whispering to me how scared I was to do this race. I had never done anything like this. I wasn’t a marathon runner, I wasn’t an athlete. I liked to go on runs because I had no one to compete with or compare myself to. I signed up for the marathon as a way to focus on something other than my infertility struggles and miscarriages. And I became very anxious and scared.
When talking to my therapist about why I was scared, she said, “What’s the worst thing that could happen, relalistically?”. After a pause, I rambled, “Well I guess I could not finish the race or I could be really slow or I could fall over and break a leg,” to which she calmly replied, “Yes those things would not be fun, but it’s not the end of the world” (she probably said something way more intentional and poignant than that, but my memory sucks so that sentence will have to do). She was right – those outcomes would have sucked, but they probably wouldn’t happen. What would probably happen was a great sense of accomplishment and joy after training for months for a race I’d never thought I’d do. And that’s exactly what happened. When my second marathon came along in 2022, I wasn’t scared or anxious at all. I figured I didn’t fall or die or break a leg the first time, so I should be fine this time, too. Hence my lack of intense training that equated into me walking roughly 15 of the 26.2 miles. Another story for another day.
I know we all have fears and doubts and very real anxieties. And that is hard. But I also know taking risks and being comfortable with the unknown pays off. Here are just a few of the things that have scared me yet I can look back on them today with gratitude: (I will note that bats and haunted houses are on my all-time fear list and will never be something I try or take a risk with. Nope, I’m good.)
- Living on my own after going through a divorce – I cried in my new apartment for at least a month. Now I love living alone and find it hard to remember the daily habits of not being solo. I do look forward to the day when I can share a space again with a partner, but I’m grateful for my current independence, however scary it was at first.
- Joining a functional fitness gym recently – y’all, this is a hard one for me because I do not have good self-talk about my body and working out. And I’ll be honest, this still scares me. But I take it one class at a time.
- Going to meetings for those living with a loved one who is an alcoholic – don’t think I’ve ever cried as much in front of strangers as I did in my first meeting years ago. It’s still hard to process out that fear, but I know the experience was important in my life at that time.
- Giving my letter of resignation from a job I loved for over a decade and not having secured my next position yet – again, lots of tears but paired with relief and new challenges that fell into place.
- Putting yourself out there on dating apps – talk about anxiety and the unknown, the apps are a place of quick judgments and first impressions, so the fear of rejection can become a lot. However, I have found that I’ve gained more confidence in being vulnerable and being myself in the modern dating world, which in turn lessens any anxieties.
My list of fears and anxieties has grown shorter over the last several years as I remind myself that all situations can teach me something, even those that scare me. I know taking risks and working through our fears that we all have is tough and hard to do sometimes. I truly believe it can be with it. I’ve seen some of my friends take chances and face fears whether it’s going to therapy to work through past and current traumas, moving across the country to start a new job that will push them forward in their career, or sharing their infertility journey with others to help those walking that path in silence feel not so alone.
I’m inspired by those in my life facing the unknowns. They are sitting down and befriending their anxiety and fears. They are pressing on. I can do it. You can do it. Let’s go and do something that scares us and watch what great things can unfold. Just not with bats or haunted houses.
Pressing On 