Facing my Failure Demons

It was a dark and stormy night. Millions of bloggers sat at their computers, fingers flying in stream of consciousness writing. They paid no attention to the raging wind outside because they had stories to tell, observations to share, rants to rant, and yes, posting photos of little Jimmy wearing his first real lace-up shoes for relatives far and wide to see. On this same night, I was also at my computer, but instead of writing, my fingers were frozen with fear. Were there ghosts on the keyboard? A trip wire in the motherboard? I ran from my computer and looked in all my closets, turned on all the lights, checked for burglars in the basement. Alas, the house was safe. I returned to my blank laptop screen and the chill returned. The demon wasn't in the house, it was in my head. And it was that old familiar ghoul: A big, hairy, googly-eyed monster that lurked in the back of my mind, whose only words were "You're a failure! MOOOUUUHHHAAAHAAAAA!"

What is so scary about writing a blog entry, you ask? Good question. A year ago, I started a blog as a way to process my emotional journey preceding the move to Iowa. I'd been through a psychological and emotional ordeal and needed to use my old stand-by humor as a way to make sense of it and move on. I enjoyed writing and shared it with my family and friends. And then, that pesky homework got in the way and I was immersed in school. I didn't have time to write and revise regular vignettes of my dating past and evolving present. So I stopped. Wrote nothing. Because if I couldn't do something perfect, I wasn't going to do it at all, right? And, what's more, I had determined that my blog was going to be a certain way and, again (notice the pattern, Dr. Rice?), once I start something, I can't change it. The same thinking that had threatened to destroy me a few years ago was rearing its ugly head in even the most mundane tasks. My sisters and friends kept encouraging me to "just write something," but what if it turned out like my childhood journals that I destroyed ten years later when I read them and thought I was stupid? What if, horror of horrors, it wasn't good enough? The other part of this frightening mindset is that I couldn't tell anyone my fear that my blog was a failure. I was lurking in the shadows of my own self-defeating attitude. And that, my friends, is the scariest part of all.

Last week I had the good fortune to see a dear friend and confidant and she asked about my blog. She is one of those friends with whom I've shared absolutely everything. I finally admitted that I was afraid to be a blog-failure. Once I said it out loud, I realized how silly it seemed. Who was I going to disappoint? A blog is basically a diary. I don't have a national circulation; there are maybe five people who read it besides me, and half of those are relatives. So, here goes: I'm saying BOO! to my inner self-doubt and will use this blog as I'd orginally intended--to chronicle my journey toward getting my PhD, living with the love of my life, and housebreaking a puppy. And that's not scary at all.