Sneak Up On Your Dreams

I’m an introvert. I need solitude and time by myself to recover when I’ve been stressed. When I was younger, I trained myself to be outgoing and social. I loved large groups and social gatherings. As I get older, though, I seem to be reverting to my introverted self.

This has caused me some confusion as far as my goals. I’ve been pushing forward on being a writer, focused particularly on communicating my ideas to the world. I’m now able to work on this goal, nearly full-time and I find myself hesitating and holding back. I couldn’t figure out what my problem was. Why, now that I have achieved the first step of my major goal, am I getting cold feet?

I realized, after writing about it, that part of me is afraid of what will happen if I’m successful. If I can get my ideas out to the public, they may be debated and discussed. People may want me to come speak and explain more. I might be asked to write more. I’m afraid of having to be more outgoing than I want and have to do more work than I want. I’m scared of what may happen, so I hold myself back.

This is all sub-conscious (until now) so I just held myself back without thinking. I now need to figure out how to move forward in spite of myself and figure out where I want to move.  None of this a psychological revelation, but when you dig something like this up in yourself you feel surprised.

What I learn from this is to take stock of where and when you’re falling down. Take stock of what you’re doing to create your own obstacles. Do you have excuses for it? Mine was that I was burned out from my last job and needed a lot of recovery time. I’ve had a couple of months off though, and I still felt like I was going nowhere. Let yourself feel lousy about wherever you’re stuck and write about it or talk to someone. Take some time to work out your fears.

Just because you figure out what’s stopping you doesn’t mean you have to blast through them. You’re allowed to hang onto your fears if you want. Just because I’ve figured out what’s holding me back doesn’t mean I’m going to overcome these fears or feel bad about having them.  I will, though, work on solving my problems and figuring out where I want to go, keeping these fears in mind.

So what should you ask when, where and how? The way I encourage my students to know when to ask questions is to monitor how they are feeling. If they are doing their work and feel a little frustrated then they are fine. If they start to feel frustrated to the point where they are annoyed or want to quit then it’s time to ask a question or get help.

Another time to ask questions is when you’re just starting something new. While starting this blog, I am reading everything I can get my hands on about blogging. I come at this knowing very little and try to pick up every hint that anyone has. At this point I’m not picky about what I read, I just try to get what I can from it.

A harder question is where you should ask. Sometimes it’s not obvious where answers may be found. I tend to start with the Internet and see what I can find. Next I check out the library and, in particular, the inter-library loan where I can get a book from any library in my part of the state. If I can’t find answers through these avenues, I start talking to people, any people. When I was struggling with exhaustion and had no idea what was wrong, I talked to everyone I met to explain my symptoms. If, on the off chance, someone had heard of a similar issue I might find out something. It took almost six months of asking before I got close to a solution.  I ended up at an allergist because someone suggested it and I figured it couldn’t hurt.  It turned out to be the solution.

The most important thing is to remember that just because you don’t know how a problem can be solved doesn’t mean that no one knows.  Find a way to frame a question about your problem and then keep putting it out there.  Living creatively means doing things differently than they were done before.  You may end up with more questions.  You may think that what you want is impossible because you’ve never seen it done before.  Don’t worry about that. Find the answers you need by asking the right questions and being persistent.