This is real

“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.”

So I have been thinking a lot about fear lately and how this word/ concept is so powerful to most of us. It blows my mind that so many people (myself included) use fear as a crutch to never truly experience life. Most of the time it is fear of the unknown that stops us from taking the plunge, all the what ifs lead to thoughts of failure, rejection, inadequacy, etc. so we never dare to venture to close to the edge of the proverbial cliff least we fall off and end up in an uncontrollable situation.

Even tasks that may seem simple to most can become a chore and a scary situation due to fear. For the longest time i was afraid of box jumps don't ask me why but moving up even an inch created this knot inside of me and made me so uncomfortable that i just couldn't make the jump without doing a step up or even without hesitating. In my head i had already given up before i even tried. I told myself i couldn't do it, because i was afraid of falling. The thing is that sometimes we need to let go of that control and let ourselves fall to experience something we never thought possible. Yes we might "fail", there is always a chance of that, but does the risk of failure outweigh never truly knowing what you could be capable of? Is it worth not experiencing all the possibilities?

In most cases I would say no, and even if "failure" occurs there is a lesson to be learned. I have become more educated from my failures in life than from my successes. That's not to say that I enjoyed the experience, or that it was an easy lesson to learn but it makes the successes in life all the more sweet. The moment your at the top and you know that you did it against your own best efforts to sabotage yourself is what continues to drive me on a daily basis.

At the end of the day fear and failure are two concepts that stop us from achieving the great things we were meant to take on in life. No matter how small or insignificant the action may seem from jumping on a box, lifting weight overhead, submitting that resume, or allowing yourself to love and be loved in return. It is the choice to go for it against the odds that enriches our lives. There is no "Can't" in this world only "Won't", but in reality you can and will do everything you put your mind to. It may not happen right away and it may not happen without tons of "failures" along the way but the moment your determination becomes reality is one of the sweetest feelings in the world, it is something that cannot be described... only experienced.

So the question I pose today is one of growth: Are you going to be the kind of person who faces fear and fights through it even if it means you fail? Or are you going to take the path of least resistance and back down to your own insecurities? Ill take the former please :)