// A lesson I wish I had learned earlier in life…

Daily writing prompt

Share a lesson you wish you had learned earlier in life.

View all responses

I think a lesson I wish I had learned earlier on in life is one that I’m still actively learning now – to take myself less seriously in some ways. I’m a pretty fun-loving person. I love to laugh! However, whenever it comes to my creative or intellectual endeavors, I find that I am often paralyzed by a fear that ironically keeps me from starting my practice too often – the fear of not being good enough, and, on top of that, never getting to be good enough. To refer to a book I’ve read that helped me flesh out this feeling, 4000 Weeks: Time Management for Mortals, I believe this mostly has to do with my fear of finitude. How, you may ask, does one have to do with the other? The answer is in my indecision. I procrastinate on making a decision about how to spend my time, further delaying the closure of the abundance of paths ahead of me as I keep my options open. This, of course, is only an illusion. Not making a decision is a decision in itself, and a limiting one at that. One must forge path without the worry that they’re making the wrong choice, because even in avoiding it, they’re probably making the wrong choice to begin with.