It seems as if I were much more courageous when I was younger (or maybe that’s the invincibility that comes with youth) and now that I really don’t have anything to lose and nothing to prove, here comes fear.  How odd. It has probably been there all along, buried beneath the hustle and bustle of living my life, raising a child, working full-time. I always wanted to write, and always stopped myself, until now.  What have you always wanted to do, and still haven’t yet? 

This morning I gave some advice to an artist who is struggling with feeling “like an impostor/fraud.”  (Women tend to do this to themselves, I’ve often wondered if men do, too?)  She has a good career, but wants to begin a new one, and is just paralyzed with fear over going from a “job” to an artistic career. She thinks all of the respect she’s received from her peers is because they don’t “really know her,” and she feels like she’s bottoming out.

I told her what I try to remember when I have ‘scared the snot out of myself” –

• There is nowhere to go but up.
• It’s fear…not reality.
• Breathe out and keep moving forward, one step at a time.
• This too shall pass

Like the Cowardly Lion, we just need courage to overcome our fear.  And just like him, it’s in all of us all along!

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, ‘Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?’ Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us; it’s in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”   Marianne Williamson

“There are two basic motivating forces: fear and love. When we are afraid, we pull back from life. When we are in love, we open to all that life has to offer with passion, excitement, and acceptance. We need to learn to love ourselves first, in all our glory and our imperfections. If we cannot love ourselves, we cannot fully open to our ability to love others or our potential to create. Evolution and all hopes for a better world rest in the fearlessness and open-hearted vision of people who embrace life.”   John Lennon

Go be fearless…it’s sexy!

XODonna