Fear presents itself in so many ways. Sometimes, it is insidious and you don’t even know that you are being infected by it. This happened to me last week after my work was featured on Design*Sponge’s Instagram feed. I was avoiding painting and once I did force myself to pick up the brush the getting started part was excruciating! Then, I totally over analyzed the painting and wasn’t going to share it. It was ridiculous. Once I realized what was going on; that fear came for a visit and planted itself on top of my heart, I knew what I had to do! I just sucked it the hell up, that’s what I did. Lol, I know it is important to be kind to yourself and be loving with our self-talk but, sometimes you need to be harsh and firm. “What the hell are you doing, Stephanie? You pick up your phone right now and share your new art!” At the end of the day, none of it really matters. It doesn’t matter if people liked it or not! What does matter and what is the most important lesson to be learned is that the act of putting it out there and sharing is where our accomplishments lie. I remember when I first started sharing my work online, I had one rule. Share it all! Share what you think is good and what you don’t like because you never know what is going to resonate with the person viewing it. Well, this little round with fear reminded me of my rule and I’m glad it did.  Are you thinking, oh, Stephanie you are crazy, we love all that you do! Nope, I’m not crazy… fear is fear and it happens to all of us.

I think I have a lot of fear hidden within me these days. I have been procrastinating putting my house back on the market, I have been avoiding putting together collections of my new art for Surtex and I keep putting off producing my own fabric and pillow collections. Funny thing is that I didn’t realize that fear was my reason for procrastinating. Well, now I know! Time to have another “talk” with myself, lol.

How does fear affect you? In what ways does it keep you from following your dreams?