Fear and Confidence - theme of the year?

This has to end. I have to stop constantly living in fear of so many things. I should have an abundance of confidence in so many areas, and yet I don't and it is once again affecting my life.

The first time my life was affected largely by a sudden loss of confidence and then an over-gripping fear was in middle school. It was baseball season and I was one of the best players in the city. I woke up one morning with a strange feeling, something that I had never felt before. It was fear. I don't know where the fear came from, but it was there - I could almost smell it so stiff in the air.

I went to baseball practice that day and it was still around me. My heart started racing, but why? Why would the butterflies follow me to the place that I was so comfortable? They didn't belong here and yet here they were. When I gripped the ball it didn't feel right anymore. Before it was so comfortable and I knew exactly what to do with it, or more like my body knew what to do with it. I never had to think about it before. Now I was overwhelmed by a sense of "there;" I was suddenly overly conscious of every stitch of thread, the wind over head, the ache in my elbow, the rock in my shoe. I went to throw the ball and it all fell apart. There was too much thinking, the rhythm of my body was thrown off. The butterflies had created a thick air of fear that didn't allow the ball to freely move in the direction I wanted. It wavered. It didn't hit the target.

From then on nothing was ever easy again. Was this what happens with the rise of consciousness, or is there something deeper that I need to fix? Either way, the problem has persisted until this day and I'm tired.

I have been attempting to address this problem on and off ever since I started this blog, but that isn't enough. This problem has to be attacked head on in order to get rid of it, and if I don't soon then once again I'll be missing a target right in front of me, whether it's singing, doing handstands, calling clients on the phone, talking to my boss, making friends, or what. This problem has gotten too deep rooted and now it's showing itself in every branch of my life.

I am constantly learning new things, but one thing that I need to learn has always eluded me - how to fail. I haven't learned how to take embarrassment and failure not only in stride, but happily. I was reading about this guy Tim Ferris who wrote the book "The 4 hour work week." He does what I've always wanted to do in life, so I spent the afternoon analyzing what it is that he has that I don't have that allows him to do all of these things.

Then I found it. I read a blog post about learning language. He learns language faster than I do - he speaks 6 fluently and learned in record time - 10 weeks a piece. He says that the key is to learn to fail, learn how to accept embarrassment. This way you don't have to spend years in a classroom avoiding the trial and error process of learning by first perfecting your skills and then moving onto real life; instead you jump in and learn at an exponential rate as you constantly try yourself in the real world. Every time you make a mistake it becomes ingrained in your brain and you learn it instantly, instead of doing weeks of exercises to learn the same thing. If you are OK with being embarrassed you will take your crappy skills and try to use them in real life situations, which once again sets you up to learn faster and more useful skills.

My friend wrote me the following this morning:

你需要克服心理障碍才能去做的东西，包括好的和不好的。好的：适当的冒险，打电话给你的客户。你需要克服不愿意长大的心瘾，才能做到。坏的：沉迷游戏，聚会，女人，你同样需要知道这样的东西都不是支撑你精神世界的长久之计。所以，你需要打破这种心瘾。 人有欲望，是正常的。但是有时候你没有欲望，还是会有心瘾。

"You have to overcome psychological barriers before you can do many things, some are good and some are bad. Good ones: Taking on risks and calling your clients. You have to get over the gut reaction against growing before you can do this. Bad ones: Video game addiction, partying and girls. You have to know that these things are not moving your life plans forward, so you have to break through the barriers in your mind. People have hopes, it's normal, but sometimes you don't want something but it is still engraved in your psychology. "

So once again here I am, at the edge of the cliff looking over. Behind me are the shadows of myself, one urging me back and the other urging me forward. "If you want to wake up, you need to jump" says one. "Don't do it! You'll die! Stay here with me" says the other. "It's safer and more comfortable." I have already seen a glimpse of reality in broken shards of the mirror on the ground, but to accept it and make the leap of faith requires the use of a different organ. The voices fill my head and then suddenly disappear. The rain pouring hard on my head, lightening striking on either side, and it becomes apparent what must be done.