Step It Up

So here I am again, using this space to write out my confessions because I still haven't summoned the courage to confide in anyone else about my anxieties.

Straight to the point, the crux of my dilemma is that I am buying into other people's dreams without knowing quite how to get the same kind of investment in mine. Not even from my friends.

Especially not from my friends. I guess I need to specifically ask people to support my efforts, like the high school classmate who asked me to support her book party. Or the teacher whose self-published book I just purchased without knowing if it would actually be useful to my kid. Or the classmate whose granddaughter wants to sell me some makeup (but I haven't called her back yet). Or all of the random stuff I've been buying for the past few days because I am obsessed with buying black-themed images for the children in my life.

I gave away a box of stuff from a subscription service that has been sending out duds lately...I should just cancel, but I keep thinking that I will get something interesting and worthwhile. I decided to give away the two books that I bought as gifts, but forgot that I had ordered a boy-themed puzzle to give away as a gift. So I guess we're keeping that one for a bit until the next wave of birthday parties begins. My brother thinks that the backpack I bought my niece was too expensive since she could just have a plain one from Costco. I bought custom note cards for two friends for their birthdays. I probably have more stuff coming, most of these items purchased to support other black businesses.

And I am proud to be in this mode and to have the means to do so. I just wish I could get myself together to see the same success.

I keep thinking that I am afraid of failure, but that isn't it since I have halfway put myself out there. Failure wouldn't even be the worst thing, since I am still obscure enough to simply fade away (and I've done that). I am afraid to succeed.

And I am in tears because I can't believe that. I won't believe it. Because that voice inside of me keeps telling me to move forward, take the chance. And it is getting louder and more persistent than the other one that's telling me to stay where I am.

The devil is a liar. The devil is a liar. The devil is a liar.

Stay tuned (and pray for me)...

Talking to Myself

I haven't written in this space in quite a while, but that's because I've been "building" over at Busy Black Woman. And I can't say for sure what that means.

I have 128 followers on the FB page. I get on average 20 reads of anything I write on that blog. I'm up to 18 followers on Instagram. Every now and then, I post something that reaches more than 25 people on Facebook (today I reached more than 120 people by posting an article about Pat McGrath). Little by little; bird by bird.

I am still very restless and anxious and unsure about the future. I know that this is the precise moment when someone should send me one of those memes about a person just about to have a breakthrough, but they quit and so it never happens. But since that hasn't happened (I checked), I will share that Ann Taylor Loft is having a sale and so is Nordstrom.

But then I found this:

But I have several dilemmas. I don't have a clue what my breakthrough is supposed to be. Do I want to sell some tee shirts? Yes. I have a few good reasons: (1) I don't want to monetize my blog with third party ads; (2) I think I have something clever to say; and (3) I'm making an investment in my work and I can't afford to give everything away. Do I want to be a tee shirt vendor? Not really, because I am a writer. But, I am trying to build a following, and I heard a voice that told me to do this. And I am not kidding. I listened to a voice that told me to invest in myself in this way.

Of course, in writing this, I am admitting that I have doubts. I am beginning to think that I was just telling myself to try something different and bold. And maybe this will be a disaster that finds me giving away free tee shirts to my handful of followers at some point in the future.

I needed to write that out--to admit that I am having big time anxiety because I am too proud to tell anyone. I don't have any safe havens for sharing my feelings anymore. This has been true for a long time, which is how and why I write as much as I do, because in any given 24 hour period, the only other person in my orbit is a three year old who doesn't really talk to me either. And while I am convinced she understands me very well, her unwillingness to express herself is just another example of how lonely and pathetic I feel.

Despite my doubts and anxieties, I am serious about investing in myself. I will keep the faith, even though it is smaller than a mustard seed right now because what choice do I have? What do I have to lose other than what I already don't have? And I could gain something...

Because I am a writer. And that is why I am still writing even if I haven't sold anything. I may not be a tee shirt/mug/shoe bag vendor, but I have a message that I want people to receive, even if I have to give some of it away for free. You might get blessed with a tee or a mug, or you might be blessed by something you read. And maybe that will spur you to buy a tee that you might remember to wear to some event where someone sees you. And that person might inquire about the shirt and you will tell them about the blog and it happens to be a day that I have been particularly poignant about some random topic. And maybe that person can change my life. Or maybe you might take your free mug to work and leave it unwashed in the common area where someone comes along and wonders who left behind this cool mug. And maybe that coworker swipes it, so you have to order another one (or you threaten to issue an inter-office beat-down). Either way, another new person discovers the blog.

And so on, and so on...