Do it scared

The art of leaning into your emotions and doing it anyway

Photo by Nick Fewings on Unsplash

I’ve spent a lot of the past week by my daughter’s hospital bedside hearing her tell me that she’s scared. Her words said scared, but her eyes told me she was terrified. I wanted to hug her and tell her that it was ok, she didn’t have to do anything that made her scared, but that wasn’t true. She had to face her fears as she needed medical procedures to be performed and there was no other choice. This week, I taught her that it was important to acknowledge her fears but then do it anyway. Or in her case, let it be done to her anyway.

I think this is an important lesson in life in general and should be applied to the way we write too. We can let fear prevent us from putting pen to paper. Fear that our ideas aren’t formed enough and that, in my case, it will be a waste of the precious free time I have. But what if we leaned into that fear and wrote anyway? Our ideas are most likely more formed than we give ourselves credit for, and even if they’re not, what beautiful ideas will make it onto the paper from the seeds we plant?

What have you let your fear talk you out of trying? Are there opportunities you regret not grabbing?

I have always wanted to be a writer. I remember reading two novels by Courttia Newland at the turn of the millennium and feeling my brain rewire as I read. I’d never read a YA novel that spoke of the stories of Black British inner city teenagers. It wasn’t my personal stories on paper but I could relate to them and I knew they were true to life. I wanted to be able to write stories that would connect to other people in the same way that Newland’s books connected to me.

I started writing with feverish abandon, creating tales set in London featuring people who looked and sounded like me. I shared them with my friends and my English teacher whenever I came up with a new chapter and they were always really well received. But the fear was still there. I was scared that people outside of my circle wouldn’t like my stories, that they would be misunderstood. So I didn’t share them. And with time, I didn't bother writing them either. I went from a 16 year old who would spend hours weaving beautiful, complicated stories by hand, to one who felt her words weren’t worthy of taking up space. For years, fear won.

Now though, I’m doing it regardless of how I feel. Right now, I’m scared of so many things but that’s ok. I’m scared my daughter won’t fully recover which makes me scared for her emotional wellbeing and her future. I’m scared I’ve not got what it takes to care for her in the ways she will need. I’m scared I won’t have the capacity to be the parent both of my girls need. These are heavy, dark thoughts that encroach into my consciousness from the moment I wake up and don’t stop until way past 1am when we both finally fall asleep. For the past few weeks, I thought there was no room or reason for writing anymore. I even considered pulling out of my Creative Writing masters, because what point is there in words at a time like this? But creativity is always important. Our words are therapy. Not only for ourselves but to those who are able to read them too.

We shouldn’t just write when we’re happy. We should write scared. We should write tired. We should write when we’re full of apprehension or feel like giving up. We should write when we see glimmers or hope or are full of ecstasy. We should show up for ourselves when we are full of hope or full of fear.

Our stories are important. Our voices bring about change in ourselves and those around us. So my take-home for you today is this: Do it scared.