Everyday for the past few months I have smelled the rotten stench of failure emanating from my pores. I have tried showering, but to no avail I still smelled it. I tried sugar scrubs by Lather and still I reeked of it. I wore designer perfumes, soaked for hours in sweet smelling bathtubs, washed my hair once a day with vanilla scented shampoo –all of that- to end up with the same result. I STILL STANK!!
Then it occurred to me the other day that this smell; this repugnant odor that I had been trying to purge myself of wasn’t failure at all. It was fear. Most animals can smell fear on a person and any species of predators dine on another’s fear. All this time I had been simply fearing the idea of failure in my life and in doing this I allowed every hater, pessimist and Negative Nancy (yes I use that term regularly) to devour the mere possibility of my victories.
Now, I know all of this probably appears to be coming out of left field. But believe me it really is just a long time coming. I have found myself in many a tight and trying situation in the recent months and the wear on my spirit was becoming more than I could bear. And then something Qiana told me when we first started dating clicked in my mind again. She told me:
If you want something different, do something different.
It is entirely too easy to wax and wane my problems, my situations or my past into irrelevance. It is also very exhausting. The very tiring cycle of fear-failure-exhaust-remorse is one draining ride.
Let me break down the cycle:
FEAR – This is when you start to fear (for example) the possibility that you are never going to be a size 2 again.
FAILURE – At this point you have started to convince yourself that you are a failure for not becoming or even being a size two anymore and begin to beat yourself up.
EXHAUST – Now you tired of all of the self-loathing and have whittled yourself down to a depressive state where you would rather sleep all day than have to look another person in the eye.
REMORSE – This is when you start feeling guilty for having wasted all of this time not being more progressive and doing something to become a size 2; which rolls right back into the fear that you will never be able to lose the weight at all.
BABY!! I am so over that ish!! Today I am coming home exhausted; pungently smelling of the sweet, sweaty funk of hard work and promise. I have to exhaust all efforts to be the best me I can be and stop fearing failure. You can never truly fail at what you give your all to. And always give your all to completion. Just because half way through your struggle to attain greatness things get rough doesn’t mean that they will always be rough (it also doesn’t mean that it is going to get any easier) and it certainly doesn’t mean to stop pushing forward and trying. Nothing were having and keeping comes without hard word and sacrifice.
I know implementing this new way of thinking and felling is not going to be an overnight change but I can’t STAND STINKING ANYMORE!!
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