Do It Afraid

“But, mom,” she said, “You just don’t understand. It scares me.”

My daughter, with her beautiful eyes, looked up at me and with all the bravery she could muster and came clean about her secret fears and anxieties. The most surprising part was that she thought I wouldn’t understand.

It’s surprising because I feel like the biggest parts of my life have been driven by fear.

To be honest, there are so many things I feel like I missed out on because of fear.

Fear of upsetting someone. Fear of not being good enough. Fear of falling. Of failing. Of never being enough. Fear of not being accepted. Fear of losing the things that mean so much to me. Fear of not being seen. Fear of not being heard. Fear of being betrayed, hurt, and humiliated. Fear of not being loved.

Ever feel that way?

I think it’s in all of us. Yet, somehow, we convince ourselves that we are all alone in this. -That, somehow, the fear monster only resides in the deepest parts of US and that WE are somehow inferior.

But we aren’t.

You aren’t.

You aren’t alone. You aren’t inferior.

Even if it feels that way. You see, the thing is: FEAR IS A LIAR.

Fear is a prison. It’s the shackles that keep us in mediocrity, telling us that we aren’t enough and keeps us looking at distorted and dirty images of who we really are. Fear is the quicksand that swallows dreams whole. Fear is the rushing current that snuffs out the light and drowns out our last breaths. Fear is the monster that will eat you whole.

But, only if you let it.

So, what if we pushed past the fear? What if we gave fear no place to grow and no power over us?

What if, instead, we did the very things that make us afraid? On purpose. What if we did them until fear lost its power and we were no longer afraid?

And, at the end of the day, maybe we won’t be the best that ever was, but we will know that we can conquer the fear instead of it conquering us.

Do it afraid.

What’s a fear you have and what can you do to combat that fear? What fears have you overcome and how?