Two Things I Want in Life (and How I’m Getting Past the Fear of Them)

Where do you want to go in life and do you want it enough? That’s the question I’ve been asking myself over the past year. There are certain things I want to do in life. One is be a speaker. I want to become a master communicator and I believe that part of that involves becoming a master at verbal communication specifically. But the whole goal of this blog and my pursuit of growth is Mastering the Simple to Become an Expert.

And that means I have to start small and build up.

Take a conversation I had recently with my sister, Atalie, about pursuing a possible speaking opportunity to a small group. This was a friend’s young men’s group who showed interest in me presenting to them based on the topics in my book. The leader showed interest while I was writing the book and we agreed to talk after I finished.

“I really do want to be a speaker. I want to contact the leader about giving the presentation but I’m having trouble actually doing it.”

“What’s holding you back?” Atalie responded.

I embarrassingly said, “Ok, I’m afraid I won’t have much to say and that they’ll ask me questions I have no idea how to answer.”

“So share about how God has grown you this last year and tell them that you are growing just like them and may not know the answers” she said with almost no hesitation.

That calmed my fear and made me think this was actually doable.

It simplified the fear and made it easier to move forward.

Subsequently, I contacted the leader that evening and asked if they would still be interested in me presenting. I am on their schedule for the end of October.

Here’s another thing I have wanted to do in my life: write a book to aid others in their transition to life after college. 

I wanted it enough that I worked almost every weekend and many, many weeknights for four months in order to get it done. But writing something and actually putting it out there for others to read are completely different things. I wanted to reach as many students as possible and part of that involved contacting local bookstores to see if they would be interested in selling my books on consignment.

This made me nervous because of the possibility of rejection.

I had to take the first step. So I contacted a local, college hangout bookstore to see if they would sell it. Sure enough, today they contacted me back and said they would be happy to sell it at least for a period of time. Score! And an exciting score at that.

Here’s my point. I’m not perfect by any means. I’m learning right alongside you. I don’t have the guts I would like to have when it comes to speaking and putting my work out there. I haven’t contacted anyone else about the potential of speaking. I haven’t physically walked into any bookstores and asked to speak to a manager about holding my book yet. But do I want it? Yes. Moving forward in that despite the fear is difficult. But I want it enough to take the first step which gives just a bit more motivation to make the next step that follows.

What do you want to pursue? Do you want it enough to get past your desire of comfort to get out there and do it? Do you have strategies to get past your fears?

I want to hear from you in the comments!

Until next time, onward!

-Caleb