Fear Factor
Sunday, September 12, 2010 at 06:38PM Time, or the lack of it, is an easy scapegoat.
We don't do something because, well, we don't have the time for it. We're juggling too many things and something has to give. Right?
Wrong. I've come to believe that blaming time for not doing something is a cop out. There's always time. If there's time to watch the Bears play the Lions on Sunday afternoon, then there's time to write.
Sure, we're busy. But there's always time. If you don't do something, it's not because you didn't have the time for it; it's because you didn't make it a priority.
I used to blame the lack of time for not writing. It was a lot easier to use this excuse after I became a parent, because, well, there was a lot less time to do the things I want to do. A lot of that time that used to go to me goes to my son. That's a reality of parenthood.
But that doesn't mean that I don't have time to write. I do, as long as I make it a priority. Something, of course, has to give. You might have to skip that Bears game, or do as I did today and hold off on tuning in until the last five minutes. As it turned out, that last five minutes was all anyone needed to watch. In those last five minutes, the Bears scored to take the lead and the Lions scored to take the lead back only to have the touchdown taken away, giving the Bears an ugly W.
So the question becomes, why wasn't I making writing a priority for so long? The answer, I think, is fear. Fear that I'm not going to be able to find the words. Fear that I'm wasting my time. Fear that I'm not good enough.
The only way to overcome that fear is to acknowledge that it exists and to confront it. In other words, you've got to face your fears.
I've come face-to-face with two fears that I'd let control me for two long. One fear that if I kept running, I'd be crippled by the time I was sixty. And a second fear that I'm not a good enough writer.
Who knows, maybe if I keep running, I will be crippled by the time I'm sixty. And maybe I'm not a good enough writer. I'm just not going to let those fears stop me from doing the things I love any more. I'm not going to let the fear factor beat me any more.
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