I almost killed my idea out of fear and stupidity

After I wrote the draft of my first blog post (Progress in Chaos), I took it to my husband for his opinion. He read it and said, “Looks fine”. I was not certain, “Really ?”. He replied, “Yeah... It’s decent”. I was still doubtful, “I mean, don’t you think there is enough content addressing the same issue? It is so amateur, not very creative at all and I feel it’s adding to the clutter.” This time he became unsure of the idea and blurted “I guess..”.

Look what had happened here. I had an idea but was overcome by fear and badly wanted some motivation. When we are seized by an unknown fear to take that one small but important step, we find justifications for not showing the courage to go ahead. I found out a lot of issues in the blog and created so much self-doubt that eventually I triumphed in planting the same doubt in my supporter as well. Here I am numbering every single thing that could go wrong in publishing the blog and I am expecting my husband to bolster my courage. He tried twice, but the third time, he became uncertain. If one is hell-bent on not doing something, it would not happen. You will find the craziest of reasons to justify yourself. Maybe I felt my work was not up to the mark (of course I am contesting for Blog of the Year!), or will be criticized for the content, clarity or I don’t know the font I used because everybody has an opinion. I was scared.

I had almost killed the idea after succumbing to self-criticism but all of a sudden I started thinking about what will happen once it is out there. Nobody will know. You can literally dump a dead body in the 2nd page of google search result and here I am worried about something which will land on the millionth page. I published it and meanwhile I found the opinion of some of my friends before making it public. They were quite encouraging and was generous enough to give some constructive feedback. After 2 days, I finally garnered the courage to make it public.

I guess if we are not so sure about something, rather than going all-in like Elon Musk, it’s better to take one step at a time. I found it to be less overwhelming. And finally, don’t be too harsh on yourself and show the courage to take that one step. Just do it instead of contemplating the idea over and over eventually losing the spark. After so many years, when we repent on the things we should have done, our list will be shorter.