Challenging Yourself
Sometimes, we float through life without really challenging ourselves. We choose relationships, activities, and jobs because they’re easy, or because that’s what we think we’re supposed to do, not because they’re right for us.
This causes us to fall into a cycle of comfort and complacency; we don’t test ourselves by trying anything new, and we end up feeling like we’re living a bland, colorless life. Everything is okay, but it’s not great.
A lot of the time, this comes from a place of fear. Fear of rejection, fear of change, or fear of failure. We avoid things that might shake up our lives for that very reason; we don’t want our lives to be shaken up, we like them the way they are. That’s where challenging ourselves comes in.
Dare to Change
Have you ever done something just to see if you could? Written a poem, said hi to someone new, volunteered in your community, or taken a trip by yourself? Sometimes, these things can scare us; they force us out of our comfort zone into a place of change and growth. But that place of change and growth can be scary, because it allows for the possibility of rejection and failure. But that’s how you learn. You can’t grow as a person if you don’t make mistakes sometimes.
Facing Fear
In January of this year, I said no to fear by starting my poetry journey. Instead of sitting around, thinking that I was terrible at writing and avoiding it at all costs, I picked up my pen and wrote a poem. And you know what? It wasn’t half bad. Since then, I’ve written over one hundred poems that I’m going to add to my poetry book, because the thought of writing and publishing a poetry book terrifies me, and I want to say that I’ve done it. All of the best writing and art comes from a place of setting aside fears and accepting flaws and failures.
Reminder
What you need to remember is that, yes, you will experience failure and rejection sometimes, and that’s okay. You won’t get better if you don’t, and you won’t get anything done if you don’t try. Learning to silence the critical voice in your head, or the voice that wants comfort over change, is a challenge in itself. But once you learn to do that, you’ll create some of the most beautiful works of your life.
Side note
As a personal challenge to myself, and to inspire my own creativity, I’m doing a thirty day photo challenge on my Instagram. I was going to start on July 1st, but didn’t get to it until July 2nd, which is not what I wanted but I’m okay with this (See? Already making mistakes and accepting them). If you want to do your own challenge, or just want to follow along on mine, I’m using the tag #inspirephotochallenge.
Wildflower Creatives 