(way to go Microsoft!!)
want and fear
In singing class at school we had a teacher who said, your want has to be bigger than your fear.
Mine never was.
Singing in front of people always felt like standing naked at the front of the room. (And this was at a time when the very notion of naked was fraught, to say the least).
This year has been remarkable, already. Mostly because I have developed a new philosophy: if you're scared, you must do it. If you fear the phone conversation, you must have it. If sending the email is terrifying, then send it. You must write the emails and open the attachments and go on interviews and sit down in front of the white blank screen more times than you can count. You must be as honest and kind as you possibly can, even when it would be easier to walk away, or say nothing at all. Because, the thing is...doing those things, changes things. Doing those things moves your life forward. Doing those things is--and leads to--remarkable.
But it feels important to say, that in doing them now, my want is still not greater than my fear, but my determination or grit or well, whatever you want to call it has finally arrived to the party. My fear is large, my lack of courage abounds, but I'll be damned if those things keep my life small. So now I do the thing that scares me most, and I feel the fear the whole damn time, and I simply keep going.
Because I don't think your want does have to be larger than your fear. It's just that, part of growing up means, fear is no longer a good enough reason not to do something.
what I'm listening to // Marcus Mumford & Justin Hayward-Young sing "Don't Think Twice, It's Alright"
in ahhh music
image via.
words to live by // 2. 22. 16
"If you want to live an authentic, meaningful life, you need to master the art of disappointing and upsetting others, hurting feelings, and living with the reality that some people just won't like you. It may not be easy, but it's essential if you want your life to reflect your deepest desires, values, and needs." | Cheryl Richardson
Gratitude
Gratitude is not a feeling that comes easily to me. In the language of emotions, it is not my default. This is not to say that I don’t understand it, or haven’t felt it, but rather that it remains further out of reach than some of the others.
I read somewhere once that we live in a society that prizes the mind above all emotional intelligence and how damaging that is, and I wonder how many languages there are, and how many of those languages exist outside the realm of letters and words.
I feel joy easily. Embarrassment too. Guilt, often. Wonder and thrill and excitement. But not gratitude. And I think it’s because I have this idea that gratitude exists when things are settled--stable. But life is rarely any of those things. And frankly, I crave movement. So I am making a practice of it. Not by writing lists, but by realizing it’s a roll-of-a-dice that separates me from the guy across the aisle on the train. It’s a roll of the dice between health and not, work and not, life and not. It’s a roll of the dice between me and the woman who gets onto the elevator, hands shaking, knees bent by the exhaustion of a fading body. And I’d like to be clear here: I’m not saying fate or luck frees us from responsibility, but rather some parameters simply are. We don’t get all the say. But we get to choose how we behave within a set of rules--to face struggle and complications with grace and kindness.
I am learning to feel gratitude even in the choppy waters. Because my iteration of this life is lucky. And when I think about that, even as I occasionally struggle to stay afloat, gratitude erupts before me. Even as terror and discomfort and confusion reign, so does a deep wonder and satedness. The landscape isn’t flat and life isn’t still. And if I waited for those things I’d never know what it is to be thankful. But I’d also never know what it is to be human, to struggle, and to keep going.