Saturday, January 14, 2012

Something different

Sometimes you need to do things differently
Today I will do something different.

Today I will speak publicly and it kind of terrifies me. I'm not really sure why it terrifies me. Likely because I fear that I will not be as good as I want to be. I want to be the best ever. I want to inspire people. I want to make a difference in someone's life.

So why am I doing it?

The easy answer is that someone asked me to do it. The harder answer is that I secretly wanted to do it. For all those reasons above: I want to make a difference in someone's life. Maybe what really want is to feel special. And being asked to speak did that, all by itself. But now I'm moving on to thinking about the doing. The "what I'll say" part. The "how I'll inspire" aspect. Wondering how I'll be special in my listeners' minds.



But what would happen if I were just special because I was asked in the first place -- or asked because I was already special? Well, then I might just understand that speaking at all will make an impact. Sharing my story with no additional pressure on the outcome will be just exactly right. Because I'm an expert on being me and that's exactly whom they asked to come and speak.

I have been doing a lot of thinking about how my brain works lately. Thinking about how to improve it -- change it so that I can reduce the impact of negative emotions. Be more productive, effective, liked, happy. Be different. Because I've been stuck and I was to change that.

And so I'm committed to doing different things because it's likely that's the only way that I will BE different. And so here I go, trying to remember that this action is as much for ME as it will be for those to whom I'm speaking.

2 comments:

Stephanie said...

Good for you! How did it go? I had to present at a conference last year and I was a nervous wreck, but since then I've done it a few more times and it gets easier. It's so empowering to do something that you're afraid of doing! Yay you!!

Unknown said...

It went really well. I felt great and got lots of compliments!