So many times over this last year I would sit here, in this very same embroidered bird armchair I sat in every morning, with this overwhelming sense of… what can only be described as the very opposite feeling of writer’s block. A feeling that my fingers couldn’t type fast enough and the “fear” that my words wouldn’t match my feelings. That I couldn’t quite articulate my thoughts or my journey. Unable to adequately put into words the very things I so badly wanted to breathe into the souls of every woman who’s reached out to me over these last two years struggling. Struggling with something. Something nine times out of ten seemed to be based solely upon fear. Knowing what they should do or could do. Knowing who they could be or would be if… fear didn’t rock them to their core. So once again, here is another peek at my writing. A peek into my soul. Continuing on with last week’s quotes…
“The fear of failure is worse than the failure itself.”
“Fear is pain arising from the anticipation of evil.” -Aristotle
“Worse than war is the very fear of war.” -Seneca
There have been so many moments in my life that have defined me. So many precious and significant moments that are forever and ever etched into my soul. Weeks, days, hours and even seconds of time that completely redefined who I was and what direction my life would then take. The day I got married, the day I graduated college, the days each of my precious girls were born, the day I miscarried twins and the early days of the recession when we almost lost it all just to name a few. Each moment in time an integral part of shaping and molding who I’ve grown to become. Definable moments that each carry their own unique symbolism for a time in my life where there was a clear boundary of who I was before each event and who I became after. As if there was the me of then and the me of now. The woman before mommyhood and the woman who can only now define herself as a mom. The woman who thought the world was her oyster and the woman who’d been scooped up and spit out by a literal recession full of disappointments. The woman who trusted so easily and the woman who learned the truth once again and finally moved on. The woman who once and for all had enough.
I’ve spent so very much time this last year and a half or so digging deep into my soul. Just me and my laptop most mornings with a strong cup of coffee and a cozy pair of pompom slippers. One thing I’ve realized amongst a million and one others is that writing is amazing. Whether you’re simply journaling as inadvertant therapy or you’re writing for a defined purpose, writing is the absolute best therapy and the deepest form of soul searching. So many of my biggest personal “aha moments” have come from these very moments. These early morning dates I’ve had with the keyboard on my MacBook. It’s as if once you put something in black and white it makes you say, hmmmm…
One such moment came to me after I wrote that very paragraph. It was as if my own mind was calling itself a liar in some ways as I shared the most defining moments in my life. The moments that redefined who I was and what direction my life would then take. Although each and every one of those definable moments of life absolutely changed my life and the course of my life… they didn’t always change ME. Or maybe better stated, they weren’t always the moments that changed me THE MOST. I went, as lots of us do, from single to married and kidless to a mommy along with in and out of feeling successful. Yet as much as each and every one of those things changed my life, they didn’t always change ME. Of course my heart grew ten million times larger with the birth of each of my girlies and my life was absolutely MADE but I can honestly say as I sit here today that the things that CHANGED ME most were the times I’ve been defined or redefined by fear. Those moments in time I was held back, paralyzed or drowning in fear. Those moments in time I was finally brave, secure, unshackled and set free by my very own internal revelations about the fears I’d placed in my own heart. It was as if the blessings in my life were blinded by the insecurities. The good smudged over by the seemingly “bad”.
Yep, I feel like I need to interject here with two million disclaimers and say that I am not even a little bit undermining becoming a parent or a spouse. Maybe, just maybe, there needs to be two lanes of life and of oneself. The half affected by the external goodness of God and the half affected by the internal dealings of the devil. Strong words I know but I do feel I have some life lessons to back it up. But first, one more disclaimer… my writings about fear and life never ever relate to death or sickness or anything of the like. We are talking business and life and marriage and inner demons here. Those “little” things I may be able to help you battle.
There have been so many moments in my life that have defined me. That first lane of life when God blessed me with two precious girlies, a marriage and a booming business as a young 20-something. And then there’s that second lane of life that hit me like a ton of bricks way back when and seemingly stole so much of the goodness of those early years. The second lane of life plagued with fear and worry and regret. The second lane of life that told me to not enjoy the present because it was only a matter of time before the next shoe would drop. Heck, it got me before the first one even dropped!
These two lanes have absolutely crossed paths over the years. Those moments when certain life events scooped me up and spit me out. Yet all I can think looking back is that the life events that did in fact scoop me up and spit me out never held a candle to the self sabotoging culmination of fear these last two decades. Fear over freaking everything.
You know those nights that you lay awake for hours upon end anxiously, fearfully anticipating a conversation or a confrontation that you foresee happening for some incredibly valid or even worse, for no apparent reason at all? You’ve worked yourself up, lost sleep, planned out the verbal novel that you just know will ensure come morning time and then BAM… crickets. The situation never happens. The conversation never takes place. The confrontation you expected is a simple two sentence run-in in the hallway that was never actually part of your 2am plan and then just like that, it’s done. Worry, fear, stress and exhaustion for absolutely nothing. As crazy as it sounds, it can almost be a let down. You’ve put on your boxing gloves and written out your speech and then the competition never shows up. The stands are empty. The fear ended up being worse than the actual situation you feared. The situation was essentially nothing and the fear was absolutely everything. You almost wish you’d worked yourself up for SOMETHING!
Or maybe, the fear that kept you up all hours of the night planning your soap box speech was all based upon a situation behind Door A when Door B was the one that ended up opening. The worry, fear, stress and exhaustion placed on whatever was behind that first door was futile while whatever behind the second door crept it’s way into your life instead.
My life is one big Door A unknowingly locked while Door B comes flying open story after story after story. I could write another novel detailing every crazy situation I feared for years and years and years. Be it business or personal. The crazy situations I feared behind Door A meanwhile an even crazier story behind Door B is unfolding right before my closed eyes.
I will never forget those days.
I never feared we’d have an employee come at us and have to call the police. I never feared a guy would have every single bone in his foot broken by the massive weight of a forklift. I never feared a sudden recession that would threaten to take every single thing we’d ever worked for. And most of all, I never ever ever in a million years feared that what happened in my marriage would happen. Over and over again. Never feared it yet it happened and I made it.
You know what I did fear? I feared a lawsuit that happened and we ended up just fine. I feared an Osha inspection and possible subsequent fine and it happened and we ended up just fine. I wasted so much damn time in fear yet some of the things I did fear still happened.
And the craziest part? All of that fear did absolutely nothing. It didn’t lessen the blow. It didn’t change the outcome. It simply sucked the life out of me and gave me less momentum and courage to get through the actual struggles. Door B had come flying open time and time again belting me across the face as I sat sideways on the sidelines of life staring so dizzyingly at the past. Fear accomplished nothing.
Had I written this post a few years ago, it wouldn’t quite be the same. It’s been a true culmination of failures that have squashed quite honestly every single one of my “” fears these last few years that have once and for all changed the very fabric of my being.
I will forever and ever and ever remember the Summer of 2019. Call me every kind of crazy in the book but it was truly the start to one of the very best chapters of my life. One of the most definable moments in the unveiling of me. I was in the middle of a terrible divorce and my future had never felt more uncertain. My stomach was in a constant knot about the craziness I was going through and I may or may not have had more calories in wine intake than actual food (like so little food that a glass or two or wine far exceeded my intake). Yet amongst it all, it was as if in the very moment that Door B had so blindside-ingly slammed me across the face that I was awakened. For the very last time. The last shackle and chain of fear and living on eggshells and the immense weight upon my shoulders was all dissolved in the very instant I made that discovery and chose to set myself free.
The TRUE realization that fear accomplished nothing. The very thing I was so afraid would happen again had happened again anyways and the very thing I was so afraid of doing was finally, once and for all, so clearly laid out in front of me.
It’s an impossibility to put into words unless you’ve lived it alongside me but I do know so many of you can relate. So many of you are or were right there where I was back in the Spring and Summer of 2019. Let’s just say that everything I’d thought was true was revealed to me otherwise along with the revelation that everything I’d blamed myself for was squashed… everything I thought was true wasn’t and everything that had held me back was no longer a thing. Never even actually was.
It was the days/weeks/months that could absolutely be defined as the worst in my life that I chose to redefine as the start of the best. I had given fear a cozy spot to rest in my life and had accepted it as normal. I had accepted the fear of “what could happen” and “what life just was” and “what I was made to feel that I deserved” (ewwww… I hate actually putting that into words) as another seat at my table of life. Fear had become a regular.
Until it wasn’t.
If fear no longer held a seat at your table of life, what would you do? Who would you be? What would you tackle? How would you redefine your life and your path?
As I’ve said and will continue to say time and time again, my writings will be a compilation of thoughts that will build upon one another right here every Monday. I will be interjecting with life updates and dating tips and business motivations and all the things but I can promise you that every single post will be raw and real and HONEST. See you later this week with more design fun!
XOXO, Brittany Hayes
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