If you don’t ask, you wont receive.
For most of my life, I was scared to ask for things. I used to think it was because I didn’t want to come across as needy, but now I’m starting to realize that I was scared of rejection. Since rejection is another form of failure, it was easier to NOT ask for things and not risk anything than it was to perhaps be a failure.
Well, that’s all changed. I’m not scared of failure. In fact, I’d rather fall on my face trying than play it safe in the corner. And this thinking is new to me. It’s something I’ve wanted for years, but until I started living and doing–and asking–I never really understood.
Sometimes it feels like riding a wave. It’s going so quickly. If I hesitate, I’ll fall. But at times I’m scared I’m gonna flip over, or crash into something. But I have to relax and know that it’s totally ok; if I crash, I can just pick up my board and get back on the next wave.
So that’s the first step: Addressing the fear of failure. Now I’m moving to step 2: Asking for what I want. It was awkward at first–and I think it came across as awkward. But I’m starting to get the hang of it. And if someone says no, that’s cool. I’ll just figure out how to change my approach, and try it again on someone else.
And no, I’m not talking about dating–but that will probably be affected by the sense of confidence that the experience of the last year has given me.
Do you have problems asking for stuff? Or fear of failure? How did you overcome it? Or are you still struggling?
I somehow got the idea I have to be uber-competent, maybe during my dysfunctional marriage and divorce, but I don’t know how to ask for help or advice and have been working on it too. I can actually do most things alone and I shoulder a lot of personal responsibility raising my kids by myself. But part of the life experience is to learn to be a thread in the tapestry of life, not the whole damn tapestry. So i’m working on it too, Chris and ITS TOUGH to pull down the defenses and actually need other people. I love doing things for other people and I know they love to do things for me, if I’ll just let them!
Mary Wallace
February 5, 2010 at 3:17 AM
Hey Mary:
“to learn to be a thread in the tapestry of life.” Love it!
I feel like when we feel like people have effed us around, then we want to control the world and our surroundings. But it is really hard to play a good game of baseball when you are playing every position. For me to achieve my goals, I have to delegate some of the tasks to someone else–and I have to ask for help.
The first part of the post was about me finding people to help me do the things that I don’t know how to do or don’t have time to do.
So today I spent a good portion of the day emailing musicians who were nominated for our Austin Music Awards to try to see if they would play at your awards show. That’s the second part of this post. I was sooo scared to get turned down–I mean, who am I and what is Republic of Austin, right? Well, I got a few yeses–and it’s exciting. I feel good
MARY! I hope I get to see you during SXSW. <3
Chris Lynn
February 6, 2010 at 12:33 AM