Fear of Failure..No More

I am usually pretty much a "get up and go" type of person and have attacked many a project over the years successfully. I've been told I have a friendly personality and there's really no one that I just do not get along with. I got through school fine, graduated nursing school and in my humble opinion made a great nurse for the years I was in the profession, have always been able to hold down a job, come from a good family, own a very successful business and have thus far raised one child that has already begun to be a positive contribution to society. Despite all of that, most of my life, when it was just me, myself and I, I hated myself.

For some reason, when it comes to truly loving myself and treating my body as such (ie: losing weight, getting stronger, improving my health), I have had a stifling fear of failure...and I don't know why. I often wonder if it could be because when you are not using food as a comforter any more, you are just forced to deal with whatever it is that is bothering you and that can be *really* uncomfortable? Too many times I threw in the towel.

Several things have been bothering me for far too long and eventually you've just got to say "enough is enough!" "Suck it up and deal with it!" Take the bull by the horns..and fight for your life.

I can honestly say right now with all my heart and soul that I just am not afraid of failing at this endeavor. I've never felt this way. I've taken the attitude that simply: failure is not an option. It is the best feeling! SO empowering.

I was having lunch with a friend a couple of weeks ago, and we were discussing "sticky situations". Like, REALLY sticky. So say you're in a car and you are stuck in some pretty deep mud. You KNOW you can get out of that mud if you really put the pedal to the metal, but you know that in doing so, you are probably going to make a real mess as that mud splatters..muddying up stuff around you. And you're going to have to clean it up. And it's going to hurt. Some of it really badly. But the alternative is to stay stuck in the mud. And go nowhere. And keep sinking deeper. What are you going to do? Lay down and die? When you KNOW you don't have to? No. You're going to fight. You're going to do what you have to do. You will survive. Failure is not an option. You will get yourself out. You will clean up the mess..albeit over time, but it will happen.

I have come to determine that the only way to fail is to quit. Just give up and decide: nope, this isn't for me. To quit would be to fail.

Though I haven't clearly worked through in my mind what has been my catalyst to really decide to change, I know that it will become clear. In the meantime, I just know that fear is a four letter word and failure will no longer be in my vocabulary.