Insane Fears and Conclusions: Happiness is a Right

There is an overwhelming fear inside of my body right now. I can't put my finger on what it is, really. I think it has something to do with the fact that I know I want to start my own business, and I am SCARED SHITLESS. It needs to have something to do with making things with my hands. Art, greeting cards, typing words, constructing words out of thoughts, thoughts into things, feeling something concrete in my hands that I then, in turn, ship to someone. I want to give little parts of myself away.

I have always known my hands to do the greatest work of my life, thus far. I used them to play Sonatas on the cello. I used them to draw. I used them to massage for 5 years. They have strummed guitars, plunked on the piano...held a baby.

Once, I asked my sister to try to define "me" by using a body part. She said, "hands." Thank God she didn't say "ass." :)

So, this fear. This underlying fear that I am incapable of following through with something. I am not afraid of trying. I am not afraid of the actual physicality of making the objects. I am afraid of sending them off to people. I'm paralyzed at the thought that someone might say, "Yes! I'll take 50 of those!" Then I have to make 50 of those. Which is what I wanted to do in the first place. But, now I really have to do it. What if they don't like my 50 of those?

You know what? As I've been writing this blog, I just realized how completely ridiculous this fear is. I'm scared that someone might actually like what I make.

Deep down, my biggest fear isn't: What if I'm not good enough? What if what I do isn't good enough? WHAT IF PEOPLE DON'T LIKE ME? What if they think I'm stupid because I did this wrong? What if they think my creations are simple or amateur?

My biggest fear is this: What if I actually believed that I'm good enough? What if all of my dreams come true?

WHAT IF I'M ACTUALLY WORTH SOMETHING?

Why am I afraid to succeed, you might ask? Why am I afraid to really and truly be happy? I think it's a combination of these things:

1. Everywhere you turn, people are unhappy. It's become the norm, and it's ridiculous.

2. Everywhere you turn, people are negative. About the price of gas. About their dog. About some drapes they got. About love. About our government. About themselves. When was the last time you heard someone say, "Damn! I look good!" Long time ago, right? Thought so.

3. Everywhere you turn, people are telling each other that they can't do things.

• "If I had a personal trainer and chef, I could look like that, too!" (Guess what? You can look like that, and you don't need a personal trainer or chef.)
• "Well, yeah...we'd all like to be a rockstar, but only so many people can do that." Anyone can do that. ANYONE. You don't even have to be able to sing anymore. I promise. Turn on the radios. You'll see. :)
• "You should go to college, get a degree, and get a stable job in this economy. " Uh...why? How is that in ANY way going to make someone more happy if they don't WANT to go to college? And who ever heard of a stable job, anyway? Especially in this economy...hee hee. See how easy it is to be negative?

4. We are taught from a very young age that we are supposed to know exactly what we want to do when we grow up. People even ask 4 year-olds, "What do you want to be when you grow up?" and they respond, "A veterinarian," when really they mean, "I want to pet animals all day long."

Some people are truly blessed to know what career they want to follow. My brother knew after watching Dead Poet's Society in high school that he wanted to be a college professor of English. So, what did he do? He got his bachelors, masters and doctorate all in a pretty little row. He is now a college professor of English, just like he always knew he wanted to be. I curse him every day. Just kidding.

But seriously? Who's to say that we need to have one career for our whole lives if we don't want one? Bor-ing. Bor-ing.

In conclusion:

What if we took one step after another towards an ultimate goal that seemed "crazy" or "too good to be true"??? What if we stopped saying stupid, derogatory shit about our bodies? What if you took ONE DAY to write down every, single negative thing you said? What if you TRULY looked at the crap you're saying to yourself every day? (All of these questions are directed at myself, by the way.)

I am just so tired of the negative shit. I'm so sick of listening to privileged people talk about how hard they have it. I'm tired of being scared.

I shall now ask myself this very pertinent question:

What's the worst that could happen if I followed my dream of making "50 of those" and sending them to people that would enjoy them?

Answer: The other people could hate them and return them, and then I would feel bad about myself for 20 minutes until someone else ordered them and loved them. Someone might say, "Those are neat, but I'm not interested." It could be really hard, and I could decide that I don't want to do that anymore, and then I would feel like I was giving up again. I could die on my way to shipping my 50 of those things.

Looking at the above list of possible outcomes, I really don't see any TRUE fears. Even the dying one would be okay because then I could see what's next, which is what is truly interesting to me in the first place. Dying isn't scary. Truly loving yourself is.

I can't believe my one TRUE FEAR is to be able to say how awesome I am out loud and truly believe it...or hear someone else say it and not look down at the floor with a whispered, "thanks."

That's the dumbest shit of which I've ever heard. I'm so sure. Scared of my own awesomeness. Thanks, brain. Thanks for another great, weirdly-shaped piece to the ol' jigsaw puzzle of life!

Gross.

Gonna go work on those 50 things that someone's going to buy soon. Love and DREAMS and PEACE and POSITIVITY to everyone. You are capable of anything and everything in this world. That's what it's here for.

And, don't let the bastards get ya down.