The Challenge

Has this ever happened to you? Have you ever told your friend (and Life Coach) that a fellow writer suggested you start a blog? And then Said friend and Life Coach, Amy gives you a 5-day challenge to write five blog posts and start your blog by Monday? Then you panic and lie awake in terror just like you did two years earlier when she challenged you to take your first writing class? 

Fortunately, my Compassionate Communication practice group was scheduled for the next day. I’ve studied Marshall Rosenberg’s Nonviolent Communication with this gang for several years and am slowly developing a language of feelings and needs, then finding strategies to meet whatever those are in a given situation.

This situation was giving me palpitations. The idea of writing a personal blog put me in a tailspin. I would be blogging about my innermost feelings, my shortcomings and my failures, my insane thinking and embarrassing behavior, not to mention my crazy family members. I hate social media, I don’t like to post on Facebook or Instagram. I don’t like people having access to me or knowing what I’m doing or where I am at all times. A personal blog felt so accessible, so visible. Plus, I would be putting out material that could be judged by all. I’d be asking to be judged by all. 

During our group’s check-in, I told my practice partners, Brenda and Lynn Marie about The  Challenge. When it was my turn to work, the three of us divided up the Feelings cards and Brenda and Lynn Marie helped me identify the feelings it was bringing up. We laid the cards out on the table and narrowed it down — Worried, Reluctant, Nervous, Embarrassed, Uncomfortable, Vulnerable and finally, Excited. 

After getting all sorts of empathy about my feelings, we moved on to the Needs cards — Self-Expression, Creativity, Learning and Growth, Fun & Play, To Be Seen for Who You Are, To Matter and Belong, Meaning and Purpose, Honesty, Authenticity, balanced out by Privacy, Protection. I was surprised by the number of needs fulfilled by writing a blog. Writing did meet so many needs for me and always had. Not only was it a way to express myself and the world around me, it was a way to understand myself and the world around me. Writing brought me to myself.

Privacy and Protection were my sticking points.

“Well, your husband is kind of in the public eye,” Brenda reasoned. “I can see how you would worry about your privacy.”

“Hmmm…” I said, considering her comment. “No, that’s not it!”

Her words made me realize that the need for privacy as well as the need for protection were internal. It was Emotional Privacy that I needed, Emotional Protection that I needed. I was afraid. Afraid to reveal myself, afraid of judgement, of rejection, of ridicule, of humiliation. In Amy’s Life Coach lingo, I was hiding. I won’t go into all the gorey details here, but suffice it to say that those fears were very old friends, friends who had kept me company most of my life. They liked to hang out in front of the television with bottles of Chardonnay and pans of Rice Krispie Treats. We were comfortable together and I could always depend on them to keep me safe.

Now Amy wanted to kick them to the curb! She was asking me to replace my old friends with….I don’t know what. Vulnerability? Growth? Courage? How would I know if I was going to like these new friends? How did I know that they would be as loyal as my old pals? If you are reading this, you will know that I found the willingness to try them out, that I have decided that Privacy and Protection are trumped by the joy of Self-expression, Authenticity, Honesty and To be Seen for Who I Am.

Challenge accepted!