Wednesday, December 12, 2012

The One Where My FILDI Is Set Free


Scared.

Worried.

Terrified.

Here I am, facing what could be an amazing opportunity for me and my business, but I’m paralyzed.

My business feels like a relationship I’ve allowed to fall by the wayside—first I stopped calling, then stopped writing, and pretty soon, I didn’t even bother with a Christmas card.

I think about this relationship all the time.

How I really should be trying harder. How I really don’t know what to do or say to get back into the swing of things. How I suck as a human being because I just can’t seem to do anything in the direction of making this one thing great.

I stand just outside of it. Staring. Waiting for the rhythm of the double-Dutch ropes to be absolutely perfect so I can jump back in, both hands up—as though feeling the wind created by the rope whipping by will help me gauge the perfect moment for re-entry.

At some point, I know that if I want to get back in there, I’m going to have to gather my balls about me and just …. jump.

But what if I fall? What if my feet forget what I was doing? What if my brain forgets the words? What if I was wrong and none of the other kids really want to hold the rope for me?

That’s where I am: hands up, gauging the rope-wind.

My brain plays a loop of  a year’s worth of excuses to not work my business. 

But a light shines like a beacon: I know—I feel to the depths of my soul—if I don’t try, I’ll wind up buried alive in a shivering, gelatinous pile of self-loathing.

All of the things I’ve been should-ing on myself with are coming rapidly to a necessity point: the one where I either take great, swift, and concise action—or plummet into a crevasse of crap. The same crevasse—I didn’t know until I was well into my 30’s—I created all on my own.

I instinctively knew this was going to be a year of inertia. In the beginning I embraced it. But the more time that went by, the more my inner adolescent started to worry. The more she started to flirt with self-doubt and then judgment, dancing dangerously close to the edge of giving up the whole idea.

But I’m not an adolescent any more. After years of mulling over the concepts involved, I accept my role in my past and choose to write my future in a language that builds and strengthens, with love for myself when I screw up or chicken out.

I’ve been feeding my FILDI oranges and whispering encouragement to it. It’s ready. It’s time. And it’s allergic as all hell to self-loathing.

So with a big breath, I encourage you to stay tuned for a big announcement.

I’ll see you on the other side … of awesome.