The Other Side of Fear

I was listening to podcasts at work on Tuesday. It was a fairly typical day; emails needed answering; phone calls required my attention; TPS reports needed doing. Then like a bolt lightning, the host of the show I was listening too utterly shattered my concentration. I scrubbed the play head back. What did she just say? It was a quote from George Addair “Everything you’ve ever wanted is on the other side of fear.” I haven’t stopped thinking about it since.

Think about everything you’ve ever achieved, and you’ll find that fear was there for all of it. That lump in your throat before asking that really cute girl out on a date. The tightening in your chest as you packed your things and moved across the country. The bead of sweat on the back of your neck during your interview for that promotion. Checking and rechecking your packed bags before taking off to a foreign country. The clenched stomach as you come out to the world as your authentic self. Fear was there for all of it.

The doubts, the worries that keep us from following our dreams are not new. We overcome them every day in a million different ways. Each of the actions I mentioned above, take at least a bit of courage to pull off. We cast aside our fears, and we press forward, towards our goals in spite of the fear trying to hold us back. It is one of the things that I find so inspirational about our dreams. At their core each one is a story about finding something we want to pursue and chasing after it, shoving our fears and doubts aside.

Our fear is something that never leaves us. It will always be by our side, and this isn’t always a bad thing. It keeps us from playing in the middle of traffic or leaning too far over the edge of the cliff. All too often though we allow fear to have too much power in our day to day lives. It tells us we can’t possibly show off our painting to another person. We couldn’t possibly get up on a stage and dance. It tells us that we don’t have the skills to write a novel. No. We allow our fears too much power, and in turn, that fear strangles our dreams before they ever get the chance to grow. We should be the ones in control, not our fear.

For a really long time, I let fear dominate who I was, what I was doing, who I was supposed to be. On the outside, it didn’t look like it. I ran off to New York City for my internship, seemingly without a second thought. I moved down to Tennessee for a job I didn’t have. I traveled the world like a pro, blogging about it at the time like a travel writer. And yet the whole time I was afraid. Afraid to face who I really was. Afraid to see that I was running from myself the entire time. Coming out was one of the scariest things I ever had to do in my whole life. By a very wide margin. It was also the most fantastic thing I could have ever done for myself. On the other side of fear, I found something amazing. Something I am still struggling to categorize and put into words. A brightness. A lightness. A solid reality that I am now actually part of, living life fully for the first time. On the other side of fear I wonder, what was I so afraid of all of this time?

Painters paint. Dancers dance. Writers write. Dreamers? We’re a bit different. Dreamers act. We move forward when moving forward seems like total nonsense. We persevere through the doubts, through the noise, and through the fears that are screaming at us to stop. Dreamers tug against the chains that hold us back, plumbing the depths of our souls for our art. We stand under the weight of our fears, as we press forward towards the impossible. Our greatest struggles will always be with the fears that are holding us back. They will tell us that we aren’t enough. They will say we shouldn’t stick out, to fit in, to conform. Our fear, when given to much weight quickly becomes a liar, holding us back when we should run. Forcing us to settle for something less when we should be reaching for something greater, something higher. Our goals, our dreams, everything we ever wanted is on the other side of that fear. You don’t have to listen to it. Run. Write. Dance. Ask that cute boy out. Be yourself. Chase your dreams! Don’t let fear stop you from taking the first steps towards your dreams. You can do this. After all, what are you afraid of?