Tag: fear
Playing to our strengths
Yesterday a nonprofit that I volunteer with hosted their annual fundraising gala. I enjoy participating but I also feel a lot of stress around this event.
One issue is feeling bad for not procuring enough items for the silent auction. I didn’t procure any this year, agghh! Another is struggling to invite people to attend because I feel awkward asking. Fellow introverts: tell me you can relate!
Part of my guilt is that the agency asks board members to do these things and I hate failing to meet an expectation. This was bothering so much that I had to find a way to resolve it.
I decided to remind myself that I contribute in other ways by volunteering on a committee and spending time on other projects and programs every month. But I needed to reinforce this idea so that I fully believed it. There was still a part of me that thought “Yes you do those things, but you should also do more for the fundraiser.”
So, I shared how I was feeling with another volunteer while we were setting up the room in the morning. He said that he also has a hard time asking people for donations and that events aren’t his strong point. Then we spent a few minutes talking about a few volunteers who are very good at it: they have great event planning skills and enthusiastically seek out services and items for the auction. We are grateful for them and know how much the agency needs people like them.
But as we continued to talk, we agreed that the agency needs volunteers that offer varying strengths. We need people who are great at fundraising and events and we also need people who are good at policy, project management, public speaking, and skills that are core to the agency’s mission. We can’t all be good at everything, but we need everyone’s individual strengths to cover the components that are critical to the agency.
I’m sure I’ll continue to be nervous about helping with the gala. But I’m finally at peace with my contributions. Staying focused on my strengths is more helpful than using my available time and energy trying to be less bad at fundraising.
The same is true in our careers. Not everyone is good at talking to clients or tracking budgets or documenting processes. Making the most of our strongest abilities will have a bigger impact than being devoted to turning a weak skill into a mediocre skill.
Leaving the Good with the Bad
Rarely are bad jobs all bad. You might have an easy commute, nice work friends and decent wages mixed in with a nasty boss and brutal hours. One of the toughest hurdles to overcome when you are making up your mind to quit your job is accepting the loss of the good parts you will leave behind.
It is normal to cling to the positive parts within a bad situation. It has a purpose: it keeps you stuck in the decision-making phase, which is uncomfortable but not as scary as walking away from a significant aspect of your life and facing the uncertainties in your future.
It is also tempting to overemphasize the positive while downplaying the negative. But if you dread going to work and can’t shake off the stress when you’re done for the day, your job is bad for you. Even if you love the project you’re working on and got a raise last month, if your job makes you unhappy – it’s bad.
It’s ok to grieve your losses and be nervous about whether you’ll enjoy your next work position. Giving up something you care about isn’t easy. Deciding to let go of the good in order to be free from the bad is brave – and worth it.
If They’re Not Cheering For You, Ignore Them
In my last few days at my old job when everyone knew I was leaving, my coworkers were great. They were glad for me, they admired my decision and many were wistful because they wished they were leaving, too.
Outside of the office, it was a different story. When I happily shared the news with friends, their responses were often negative. One pal’s reaction was “Oh no, I’m sorry.” And then, “Why did you do that?” This was a guy who had listened to me complain for years about how exhausted I was from working all the time, who knew that I wanted something better for my life.
They weren’t trying to be mean; they just didn’t understand why I would leave a steady job to go write for a month and launch a business. They were a little concerned about the risk I was taking but mostly they were reflecting their own fear.
They were unhappy in their careers but afraid to make changes. They projected their worries about what would happen if they didn’t have regular jobs. The uncertainty was too scary.
I was disappointed that these friends didn’t celebrate with me, but I understood why. I also understood that I didn’t have to listen to their doubts. The cheering section was much more fun!
Fear is a Powerful Motivator
Last weekend I went to a monthly creativity group meeting that I’ve belonged to for about a year. We do fun little art and writing projects that stimulate creative thinking and help get past blocks.
At this meeting, the facilitator gave us a piece of paper with a quote from Jill Badonsky on it. Part of it read, “Many of us think we need to push and pressure ourselves in order to reach goals, and we ruthlessly call ourselves names without much regard to what this is doing to that little spirit inside of us that’s in charge of much of our creativity.”
I don’t call myself names, but when it comes to working on my manuscript I think I do need to pressure myself. I’ve written before about how much I struggle to make progress on my book. For my entire life I’ve been driven to achieve every goal I’ve set, and just plugged away at it until I was done. Until I started writing a book. And it drives me nuts.
At first I established a goal of writing every day, but I ended up with more poetry than book content. I made more progress when I decided to write at least one book sentence each day. Then I used Nanowrimo to push to 50,000 words. And finally I set and achieved the goal of finishing my first draft by the end of 2013.
Since then, I’ve been struggling with my rewrites. I love editing other people’s work, but when it comes to my own, it is so damn hard.
I don’t hate it. It’s more like being afraid of it.
Writing first thing in the morning helps. Eating well and exercising helps. The momentum from the chain habit worked very well for about 100 pages, but after I got sick and broke it, it was easy for me to break it again when I went on vacation last week. And since I’ve been home, I haven’t gotten back into a routine yet.
Part of the challenge is that my revisions take a different type of energy and brainpower than I’m used to using. I have to get my head into my topic without distraction and stay there, laser focused, until I have an idea of what needs to change. The changes might be moving paragraphs from one place to another, filling out a skimpy section, or trying to write a smooth transition sentence. Sometimes I stare at what I’ve written and I know it doesn’t work. It doesn’t work at all. But I don’t know how to fix it.
My most useful tactic in the past for achieving my goals was simple: I just kept working on it until I was finished. No obstacle was insurmountable. But with my book, I can stare at a page and not know what to do. This can go on for days.
Then I go to my two-sided writing hell, where on one fiery wall of doom are the parts of my book that I don’t know how to fix and on the other is a flaming mass of pressure to just finish the damn thing.
Last night I finally had enough of carrying around the feeling of fear in my chest and decided that today would be better. I got up and started writing this post. I still have to work on my book, an article and some consulting work, but I am determined to channel that tension into productivity.
I would much rather be propelled by positive energy, but I’m not alone. Lots of people are motivated by fear. On Tuesday night I listed to a TED Radio Hour show about Diana Nyad, who at age 64 swam 110 miles from Cuba to Florida. It took her 53 hours and was her fifth attempt.
On top of being cold and exhausting, there were sharks and poisonous jelly fish. But Guy Ross, who was interviewing her, noted, “It seems like you were more scared of not making it.”
Nyad answered, “Bingo…I think the fear of failure is a stronger motivator than any other fear.”
Then I read an article about Robert Kirkman, the writer of The Walking Dead comics. He said he sets an unrealistic goal each day, like writing 12 pages, and then when he is only able to complete half of that he has a “crushing sense of failure”. Then the next day he works harder to make up for missing the deadline.
So that’s where I’m at today. Working harder to make up for the progress that I didn’t make over the last ten days. And feeling surprisingly unafraid.
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