What’s one thing you’ve been wanting to do but still haven’t done?
For me, it was writing this blog. The idea was always so enticing, but I was petrified every time I even thought about it. Fear and insecurity would consume me. What if no one ever read it? What if I was a bad writer? What if nothing ever happened?
So I spent the past few years with this dream in the back of my mind, gathering dust. I had a started a blog a few years back, but nothing ever came of it. What I thought was going to be a fun hobby turned to be a chore and I convinced myself that this wasn’t the thing for me.
I would go months without ever writing anything and then I would feel guilty for ever thinking this was something I wanted to do in the first place. Eventually, I came to the realization that it wasn’t that the fact that blogging wasn’t for me that was stopping me, but I had lost my purpose. I had lost my “why“.
So I signed up for a few online courses and thought I was ready to take the leap. Annnnnnnd then they sat in my inbox for the next 6 months as I mentally ran back to my corner and let the waves of fear and insecurity wash over me.
Then, one day earlier this month, I got an email from my old website telling me that ariwatkins.com was going to expire and that I needed to pay up or everything was going to be deleted at the end of month. In an instant, I woke up. I realized it was do or die. I was either going to go all in or give this up and have to walk away from this forever. Ready was never something that was ever going to happen. The longer I waited to be ready to write and to think I was going to be good enough was never going to happen unless I just took the leap.
I just needed to bet on myself.
I just need to do the damn thing.
It was an all or nothing situation. So, being the dramatic being that I am, I ended up paying for my old website to live (I still can’t yet bear to part with it) and then I bought this website that you’re reading on now for the next five years. I bought it with the promise to myself that if I didn’t do something with this for the next five years, that I am going to let this dream die peacefully.
So here is the virtual promise I’m making to myself and to all of you. I will grow this blog over the next 5 years. I’m not sure what it’ll become or what will happen, but I’m going to do my damnedest to make this a place where dreams can come true. (Whatever those might be in the future)
I’m writing this mostly to keep my accountable, but also as a reminder to bet on yourself. You are capable of crazy things, even if they tend to scare the living daylights out of you. But you are the only one that can make things come to life. People might be able to see things in you, but they won’t be able to flourish unless you believe in them too.
Oh and in case you were wondering, I did actually start working through those courses.
