It's been nearly a
year since I knew God was calling me to move to Gainesville.  It meant I had
to get rid of most of my stuff and downsize.  That was hard.  It was harder leaving my family and friends behind.

But, nothing compares to the
difficulty in the stripping away of my fear of not doing it right.  This stripping has not been like the pulling off of the band-aid kind of pain.  It's more like the pain a burn victim
experiences as the charred flesh is removed. 
(A vivid but accurate metaphor.) 

I was brought up in a home
that's motto was, "Don't do that, what if (insert anything here) happened?"  My family
was good at rehashing our failures as proof that we can't cut it
and/or as a threat of what might happen again if we took risks.  I've
spent my entire life trying to make sure that "what ifs" of life never
happen to me.  And I am especially good at rehashing past junk to remind myself why I shouldn't take risks.  

Seth Godin says
that "anxiety is experiencing failure in
advance."   He's right.  I experience virtual
failure over and over again with each fearful and feeble attempt to
avoid really failing.  How pathetic
is that? 

It's like going up the
first, long hill on a rollercoaster and trying to do everything you can to
avoid the inevitable, gut-wrenching drop.  Once you realize you can't
avoid it, you give up, get out of the car, and walk down the chicken
steps.  You get all the anxious anticipation of the fall, but not the frightening
thrill of the actual decent.   

There is a lot to be
said about being tossed about by the

sheer force of swift movement and coming to the

end of the ride with windblown hair and a big smile.

(to be continued...)