I am giving myself credit these days and doing a bit of a happy dance celebration because what I have feared I have dared to conquer! My fear of technology. You know that old saying that there is nothing to fear but fear itself, well that is so true. So often in times past, I have worn my dunce cap and handed over my power, my ability and know how around computers and technology to technicians or someone who appeared to have more knowledge in this area. Since technology is not one of my natural gifts, it was easy to do and my fear of this insurmountable obstacle made it much bigger in my view. As with most things in my life, I have discovered, that it not so scary or hard as it first appears.
I got to the point where I decided to take action to begin to cure my fears, and unlike tackling any insurmountable mountain, any good climber would begin at the bottom, base camp, and take the first step. My first step was to know what my goal was, which for me was having control over all aspects of my own website as my bigger goal is to be able to offer many of my services on line. Next step, was to enlist a good Sherpa guide in the form of an online website creation workshop. I have always had the smarts to ask for assistance and find the teachers that will do this in a way that will empower me to believe I can do it for myself. Not unlike what I do with my clients in their process of working with me. One of the brilliant features this guide taught me was not to be daunted by the highest peak, but keep my attention towards each leg of the journey and trust that by doing so the end will take care of itself. I often drew on my memories of training to run a marathon as when I would get overwhelm and think how would I ever complete this, I did the next thing, which for the marathon was do the next run and the end result would take care of itself. This sufficiently quelled my feeling of any overwhelm and I trusted my guide’s advice and stayed with my focus on each individual task and didn’t allow worry to talk me out of my end goal. I must admit this web design felt sticky and tangled at times and I encountered doubt and frustration wishing I could just jump ahead and out of this tedious techy world. After all I was an artist right? Big Picture and all, what was I thinking delving into the details? Well as the saying goes, God is in the details, meaning that the success of any large endevour can rely on the success its smallest components. With perseverance, and support from the course and trusted collegue, I found my ability, knowledge and techy fluency increased. Then one day about half way thru the course, I noticed my husband looking at me somewhat astounded (he was the techy in our family and one of the people I would call in a panic when I came across something I didn’t understand in techno world) as techy jargon flowed from my lips like poetry (well almost lol) and I was showing him something that I had learned of which he didn’t know. Hooray, I am getting this, I had gone over to the dark side and was enjoying it! The feeling of tackling this challenge and the empowerment I received, as reward was exhilarating for me. And now, one year later and I must add, one of the most challenging years of my life, I have graduated the course, I have my re vamped, personally designed website and the creative control I longed for.
I can trust that as the world I live in becomes more technologically based I won’t be left behind because of my fears. My biggest learning is to trust me and honoring my knowingness to do this and able to discern when I do need help. Often I doubted if this was a huge colossal waste of my time and money and I had to remind myself to trust that the bigger me knew this was a challenge worth accomplishing. It also reminded me how the bigger the accomplishment the bigger the reward. In this situation , I have this wonderful foundation of technology knowledge. I still may not understand where this is going, as I weave my way through this world wide web, however, I do know is that I no longer feel stuck in it instead I feel empowered and full of possibilities as to how I desire to move forward and build my business on line. As well, it is my choice and my terms, now that’s the empowerment I was looking for. Action really does cure fear!!