my biggest fears.
Now, what do I fear the most? I believe that I fear a lot of things and that's fine. Because they're usually pretty small and generic and doesn't affect me the way my biggest fears do. So what are my biggest fears? Well, I have two. The first one is being myself and the second one is failure. These two fears have held me back for so many years and I feel as if I don't overcome these fears, I'll miss out on many more opportunities.
Why is being myself a fear of mine? I feel like it's human nature to be worried about what others think of you, no matter how many times you tell yourself that you don't care. I recently re-read The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde and it has really opened my eyes in so many ways but a quote that really stuck out was 'There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about'. And honestly, it's true. No matter what you do, whether it's good or bad or even nothing at all, someone will always talk about you. And I used to hate that, and I guess part of me still does, but I hated the idea of someone talking about me. Which is why I have a fear of being myself. In my mind, I need everyone to like me in some way. And that's never going to be the case. I am never going to be everyone's cup of tea. I can't keep changing myself to please someone else and you know why? Because even then there are a certain characteristics that someone else won't like about me. At the end of the day, I will never be able to win. There will always be a group of people who don't like me. Not because I've done something to annoy them or for any other personal reasons but just because we simply don't click.
Trying to be myself and trying to become the best version of myself is so scary. Even when I'm with a group of friends, it takes me a while to open up and 'be myself' and be comfortable. But it's extremely scary in general because I don't know who I'm going to become at the end of it all. What the final product would be and when it will be. As life goes on, like an app, I'm constantly updating myself as circumstances change in order to make sure that I will be suitable for that moment in time you know? I don't what version 16 of Sweena was like and I don't know what version 24 of Sweena is going to be like. But one thing that version 21 of Sweena knows is that being myself is not a bad thing. If people can accept me for who I am and who I will become in the future, that's all that matters. Obviously this fear is not going to go overnight, it's going to be something I will try to get over every day. But acknowledging it instead of ignoring is the first step in going about it.
Moving onto my second biggest fear, failure. Failure scares me, has always scared and still scares me. The idea of letting people down, letting myself down is overwhelming and makes me put so much pressure myself but it also impacts my self esteem in ways that I can't really describe. I've often let my failures define me as a person and makes me doubt my ability. This has led me to miss out on some things because I've thought that I would not be good enough for it and this becomes a reoccurring cycle.
It's so easy to think of failure as negative thing because there's always been negative connotations around it. But the thing we don't realise, I didn't realise and sometimes still ignore is that failure is necessary. There is no such thing as not failing. No one can tell you how to be successful, that is up to you. No one can tell you what failure is, that's also up to you. People have different goals, somethings you might think is a failure might not be a failure in someone else's view. Failing happens and it's normal and it's important to know that.
However, the main thing I have realised is that it might not necessarily be the idea of failure that scares us the most but the uncertainty of what comes after failure. That's what's scary. Because you don't know what happens next or how to go about failure. You can either view failure as a positive thing because, by taking it as a positive thing, you'll actively use it to motivate you and move forward with your life but if you take it negatively, you're going to be stuck in this dark hole of uncertainty. Failure is still scary, whether you take the outcome of failure positively or negatively.
Anyways, I don't know if I included everything I've wanted to in this post but I hope that you've enjoyed it. And I hope everyone is doing well, there has been a lot that has been happened in the last few months. Hopefully you're all looking after yourselves and keeping busy.
Please check out the links that I am going to include below in relation to the Yemen crisis and Black Lives Matter movement, and support in any that you can. Either by donating, signing petitions or even educating yourself, talking about it and researching for more resources to help in way that you can.
Thank You :D
Forever amazing me man! So so so beautifully written 🥺❤️
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