Self-doubt and Happiness

I was woken at 6.30am and duly nudged to write this blog post, so taking a leap of faith I have finally stopped resisting and here I am!  It’s been over a year since I’ve posted.  I have been writing but never quite got around to posting anything and then the moment would pass and I felt less likely to, until suitably wrapped up in busyness, my blog slipped out of my day to day concern.

 I have just finished reading Gretchen Rubin’s ‘Happiness Project’.  It is a very thought provoking inspiring book but what impressed me most was her honesty, her authenticity and her sense of self-acceptance.  One of her guiding affirmations on her quest to explore happiness was to “Be Gretchen”.  This meant really embracing her own real likes and needs, not what she would like them to be or what she felt other people might like or expect.  

And so as I reached the end of the book, I was starting to see why this book might be relevant to me. (When I picked it up in the shop, I was looking for a birthday present for my dad but I quickly realised that it was I who needed this book and I got confirmation tingles when I decided to buy it).  I could feel I was starting to get my aha moment but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it.  I’d just read this very detailed book about Gretchen’s life.  There were many aspects I could relate to and some were revelations as they had been for her. For example I really love children’s books too but have never really acknowledged it and had limited myself to only reading these books with my kids.  Now I have given myself permission to read kids books for my own enjoyment too and plan to re-read the whole Anne of Green Gable series that I loved so much when I was growing up.

The thing that really struck me was although there were lots of other aspects of Gretchen that maybe I couldn’t relate to that easily, it didn’t stop me admiring and liking her, respecting that she was different to me.  I was intrigued that I found her so interesting.  I think this is down to her transparency and honesty.  She didn’t airbrush the difficulties of being disciplined enough to stick to her happiness resolutions. 

So how does all this translate to me?  I spend a lot of time journaling my ups and my downs, my feelings, experiences, sometimes poems or songs, but for my blog, I had decided it was only to be poetry.  Sometimes poems come easily. Sometimes there are gaps, but in the meantime when I allow myself, I scribble away filling up my journals.  This isn’t work, it’s just what I like to do.

I was also woken up yesterday morning early and the message was to wake up, grab your pen and start writing.  This is for your blog.  But I was super sleepy and by the time I did wake up and start writing I wasn’t sure what the blog post was anymore….

Self-doubt is one of my travelling companions in this lifetime and very obligingly came rushing in to reassure me that no-one really wants to read what I have to say.  But I have also realised that since I know self-doubt is there, it’s up to me to first just acknowledge that’s it’s popped in again and then continue whatever I am doing regardless.

I realised I had made the confines of my blog too narrow.  I want to be able to write about anything I feel like writing about.  I want to explore the freedom of self-expression  through honesty, transparency and authenticity.  It doesn’t matter whether anyone reads this or not because in the act of writing and posting I am exploring my vulnerability and this is the start point for growth.  To stretch out of my comfort zone away from the ‘safety’ of poetry into the unknown…