I sat on thoughts and ideas, afraid to disclose them beyond a few acquaintances. I drafted the outline, bullet pointed the ideas, mapped out the audience. I journaled and took notes from books and jotted down my own perspective, my personal experiences and did nothing with it. I did the work and then stopped before total execution.

I let another idea go. Afraid of how it would be received. Afraid of judgement, exposure and relevance. An introvert uncomfortable with the potential level of attention manifesting an idea would bring. I had anxiety about developing and releasing an idea to the public and having to stand alone with it. Vulnerable.

” i’m an artist and sensitive about my…”

Time passed and one day I stumbled on a very similar concept and I was floored. I cried. How could someone else be manifesting my idea?

silence, brought on by insecurity and questioning my self confidence, I could only turn to the face in the mirror for answers. Mine. I chose not to do the thing that I’d been so excited about, despite urging from a few supporters who knew about it.

” the world is big enough for you to do this, you can still do your thing. it’s not even called the same thing.”

Still I fell silent. I retreated into the spiral of thoughts that begins with “another dream not realized…”

How often do we find ourselves so very skilled at encouraging and guiding another to actualization yet we can’t muster the same energy to birth our own? Oddly enough, it only becomes worse when others who you’ve helped don’t even offer assistance to you. Fighting the temptation of playing victim, we just let it go.

I decided, as i had with other ideas, it’s simply not for me to experience this and I moved on to something else. That gnawing feeling of abandoning another idea doesn’t go away. I withdraw, isolate, get really quiet and wait for it to pass. It does, sorta.

THIS is the habit I have been unable to shake. The lesson that repeats again and again for me.

Time to break it…here we go.