On Going Outside...

Ah, the comfort zone...that wonderful, glorified prison.

   

I love being comfortable...coasting...dreaming.  I can talk a big talk without risk, but it's only been in the last few years that I've put feet to my dreams.

I recently closed my Etsy shop...a venture that was risky when I started.  I put myself out there artistically.  Knock me over with a feather, it was successful!  Selling my creative works was also fun...inspiring...it put pennies in my pocket...but it wasn't what I was meant to do.  

I distinctly remember having a sleepover with a friend when I was in grade school.  The fun activity we decided to do was to write a book.  I wish I had saved that partially written book.  I wrote 3 or 4 chapters.  It was about babysitting and I remember that my protagonist was THRILLED to find out that the new neighbors would pay A DOLLAR AN HOUR if she babysat their child...one child!  I also remember asking my mom to come upstairs to hear our progress.  She sat patiently, listening to 10-year-old sentences strung together with 5th grade panache.  She said I had talent, a gift for writing.  My 10-year-old self didn't doubt that one day I'd write a book!

Why does our adult mind tell our childhood dreams that they are stupid, impossible, and unreachable?  Why do we listen?  Comfort.  It's comfortable to stay the same. It's pleasant to live day to day without fluttering butterflies in our stomachs or the stress of potential rejection.  Then maybe it hits us...I'm ____ (insert age here).  In 10 years I'll be 10 years older whether I tried to do that thing I've always wanted to do or not!  C.S Lewis said:  "The future is something everyone reaches at a rate of 60 minutes an hour, whatever he does, whoever he is."  True, Mr. Lewis, very true.

2014 is the year of doing...of doing the things I've always told myself I would do but haven't had the guts (or is that faith?) to do.  

Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding.  In all your ways acknowledge Him and he will make your paths straight.

Proverbs 3:5-6