Why I Get Scared

Agility is a popular word today. At a time in the world where no business or industry is exempt from disruption, it's more than just a trendy slogan. It's a necessary skill. 

It implies being responsive and being able to act in real time. But it is also about being open, trying new things and being willing to put oneself in a place where one might fail.  In other words to face what might scare you and do it anyway.

The path I chose when I left the structure of 9 to 5 corporate life has tested my agility. It's forced me to bend, regroup, sometimes backtrack and to get comfortable with the nausea that swells up in my throat when I decide to give something new a try.

To say I never get scared would be an outright lie. I get scared. A lot. Scared of failing. Sometimes that keeps me frozen in my tracks - especially right after something doesn't work. Other times I've dusted off my shoes and gotten back on my path without missing a beat. Or as Seth Godin said so brilliantly in his post last week - to remember to "dance with the fear." 

Today I'm scared. But I'm choosing to follow Seth's advice.

I'm launching a new product. It's birth is the result of requests I've been getting for a while to offer workshops that help to take the mystery out of all this digital "stuff" we are incorporating into our lives. I've been doing this in corporate settings. And of course, I've been teaching digital marketing at NYU for over a year. But this is the first time I am taking this to the streets - so to speak. 

The first topic Your Digital You - THE BLUEPRINT- a workshop designed to improve your digital profile fits what I consider a universal need. Universal in that no matter who you are or where you fit into the food chain, you should be putting attention on the digital version of you - the you that shows up when someone Google's your name. It doesn't matter if you want to be an influencer - want to grow your business - or are looking for your next job - people are searching for you online. The question is how much effort you are putting into what they will find.

That's what this first workshop is about. 

• Evaluating your current footprint.
• Getting clear on the story you want to tell about you.
• Creating a blueprint that optimizes your digital presence   based on your needs.

I've decided to keep this series of classes small - just 8 participants per workshop and to offer a choice of dates and times in May to fit your schedule. You can register here - use the discount code FOJT and get $25 off the workshop fee.

As I already admitted - I'm scared and yes a bit nauseous. But I'm also really excited to offer what I know will be a useful, informative, relevant and of course fun workshop! If this is for you register here. If it is for someone you know please share. Lastly, if you have questions, please use the comment section.

On Being Brave

I wasn't a brave kid. Take me someplace new and I did not stray far from my mother's side. I was shy. Afraid to open my mouth. Never knowing what to say. Terrified I might be  made fun of.  

I remember how it felt to be like that. When fear would consume my core and render me immobile. Unable to take a step much less even explain what I was feeling. 

To know me today, this might sound hard to believe. But it's true. Just ask my mother. She'll illustrate with the story of what happened when we first moved to Glen Oaks. 

The neighborhood, which sits on the outskirts of Queens, was an idyllic place to raise a family in the sixties. The apartments surrounded big grass courtyards lined with benches and filled with baby boomer kids allowed to play outside without having to schedule a date to do so. The neighbors watched out for each other. It was a safe place.

Apparently I was not convinced. 

One of those first days in the new apartment I was outside. My mother heard me screaming at the top of my lungs and raced to my side to find me standing in the middle of a circle of kids, tears streaming down my face, tiny fists clutched tight to my doll carriage.

I was too busy crying to say a word so she asked the kids what happened. They told her they didn't know.They told her they were just trying to be my friend.

That's how not brave a kid I was. 

I've struggled with being courageous and with speaking my mind for most of my life. I know what's it like when my body reacts, my mouth goes bone dry or my legs feel like they might give way underneath me.

Sometimes I've been clumsy in how I've gone about overcoming my insecurities. Somedays I still am. Somedays that inner child, the little insecure girl afraid of doing or saying the wrong thing wants to come out and play. 

I've learned how to deal with her now. But she has also made me acutely aware of what it takes to be really brave. She knows that even if it looks easy, it never is. And she still reminds me to pause and take note when someone else is stretching into their own courageous acts.

When I see a young woman, like Christina Huffington on the Today Show talking openly about how her addiction to cocaine almost killed her, I am in awe. When I read her articles on the Huffington Post and her story in Glamour, I am struck by her ability to be that articulate and honest about something that - given the option - which she had - most would hide from the public. She chose to be brave. She chose to demonstrate courage. She doesn't need the notoriety. She was born into it. Her mother is Arianna Huffington. She chose brave so that she might help others with her story.

I don't know what it's like to have that kind of substance addiction to anything but chocolate or coffee. 

But I do know what it's like to push past what might otherwise limit us. I know how appealing the choice to run and hide and not say a word can be. I know the risk that comes from putting yourself out there as fair game in a digital world in which there is no topic we will all ever agree on and something called Twitter that invites open discussion which too often includes spewing not so nice comments. 

I still struggle with being brave every day. Each time I hit publish on this blog and expose a little more of who I am and how I think  I get a little braver. But I never stop being scared.


Note: The doodle is an original - created on a very cool new social site called Doodle.ly


Like this blog? Don't want to miss the next one? Sign up here to have it delivered right to your mailbox! 

My Greatest Fear - Day 12

There are a lot of things to be fearful about in the course of a day living in New York City. My list includes things like like tripping and falling into the subway tracks and walking under scaffolding and having it collapse on top of me. A former colleague used to refuse to walk under one of those ladders attached to an old fire escape in front of our building because she was afraid of being decapitated. Swinging cranes, slick subway stairs, everyone who lives here has their one fear that makes them really shake.

While you might think terrorist attacks top my list they don't. My greatest fear is being run over by a bicyclist.

In theory this fear should be easing now that the city has created more car traffic in order to build bicycle lanes. Pedestrians have the sidewalk, cars and trucks their lane , and now bicyclists theirs. They can pay attention to traffic lights and slow down at intersections like the rest of us. But they don't.

They come out of nowhere, running red lights and way too often riding against the direction of traffic. Each time I gasp, thankful I wasn't in their path.

It happened to me again just the other day. This time I thought for sure I was going to be splayed across  Broadway and 66th. I had the light and there he went, helmet secured, eyes fixing on the road in front of him and not the pedestrians who had the right of way. He raced through his red light faster than the speed limit for automobiles and in the opposite direction of the traffic. What saved me was  noticing the couple next to me stepping back as they caught sight of him a few seconds before I did. If not for that moment, my greatest fear would have been met.

They have their own lanes and now they have signs to remind them that the pedestrian has the right of way. Apparently they are still riding too fast to read them - because I still have my fear. 

note: This is Day #12 of a 30 Day Experiment. Here are the details on how it all started.

It All Comes Back To Here

I know this place. I've been here before. Right before I am about to embark on something new this fire starts within me that screams STOP! Danger Zone! Get out while you can! And it is all I can do to keep it at bay.

The weirdest thing about it is you would think it would make me want to run. Move to some less expensive city where no one knows me and get a job at Starbucks. (I hear Starbucks gives their employees  health insurance, a lure if ever there was to aspiring to become a barrister. But I digress)

Instead of the urge to flee I become frozen. My brain locks. And I come up with 101 things to do that are not on the task at hand. Like writing this blog.

Yes, I am right on schedule for my next book, part guide, part manifesto on creating more time for your life. Which means if the demons trying to get in the way of my time line don't win, somewhere around May 15 you will be able to buy a copy.

The irony is that I wrote this book to help others with exactly these kinds of hurdles and here I am avoiding writing the book blurb and checking the last set of edits. I am not listening to my own wisdom. I hate when that happens. But I know why.

I am afraid. I am always afraid when I am here. I am afraid of failure. I am afraid of success.

And even though I know this is the good kind of fear, the kind that pushes my boundaries and propels me forward, I still tremble.

I know where to start. With the timer. My secret sauce. The source of inspiration for this new book. You'll learn more about the timer soon. But for now let's just say I'm test driving the content.

Good Enough

I admit it. I watched the Whitney Houston funeral Saturday afternoon. I even hit record in case I missed something. I'm not sure what drove me to turn it on. Probably the same thing that has driven me to watch other televised memorials. A morbid curiosity to uncover how a life filled with so much potential could end so soon. Or perhaps just the writer in me that never tires of story, true or fiction.

In any case there I found myself. Lying on the couch with a cup of coffee tuned to CNN.

I'm sure I'm not the only one who was surprised that Kevin Costner was invited to speak. What surprised me even more was the depth of what he said and the clues he gave to what went wrong.

Whitney, he told us, was worried about being good enough. Which upon first hearing makes me laugh. Inarguably she had one of the most legendary voices of our time. How could she not know that she was good enough? How could she even worry about it?

But she did. With all of her fame and her celebrity status she worried about the same things we all do. Doubt and fear transcend race and socio-economic status as does that question of being good enough.

Smart enough, thin enough, fast enough, strong enough, talented enough,  lovable enough, to be deserving.  The prize could be the record contract, the book deal, the guy, you fill in the blank.

Her fears of being enough seemed to lead her to a dependence on alcohol and drugs as a way of coping and that led to her untimely death. For many of us, our fears of being good enough lead us to not even try for our prize.

We all saw her genius and talent, yet she worried it wasn't enough. Maybe in her reflection we can see our own.

Patience Is A Practice

My cousin used to say that patience was a virtue and neither of us were genetically predisposed to it. It's true. I come from a long line of impatience I've inherited through my mother's side of the family.

Reinvention requires patience. Things can happen much slower than you'd like. Whether you are starting a new business, trying to get a book published or looking for your next great success. Impatience just makes whatever you are working to create take that much more time to manifest. It's a sign of fear. If you have faith in your work patience requires less effort.

Some days it is easy. But since its not in my genes, there can be days like Monday.

I stood on the subway platform wondering why not one of the four trains that ran on those tracks was showing up. I felt my impatience rise up inside and start to take over my body like some alien being. I tapped my foot. I looked at my watch. I took out my iPhone just to make sure it said the same time as my watch. I let out a sigh. As if any of my actions was going to make that train show up any quicker.

Tuesday the monster was not quite done with me. This time I was waiting for an elevator on the way to a seminar.

I caught myself each time. I remembered how my days in Corporate America were filled with appearances from my impatience monster. All those things I couldn't control, thinking my fury was going to make things happen any faster.

It didn't. Things show up when they are supposed to. The subway did . So did the elevator. I knew that. I just forgot. I couldn't control when the subway or the elevator came so I let the impatience monster have its way with me. I forgot that the one thing I can control is me.

Patience. It's a virtue I am learning to own.

Giving Birth

Writing a book is alot like giving birth. I say that never having had children. But I believe it. It is a creation. There is a process to it. The germination of an idea that requires patience and nourishment. It can't be rushed. It knows its own time. If you force it out before it is ready there are going to be problems.

I was in a conversation yesterday about birth. I was having a rainy Friday afternoon lunch on the Upper West Side with a young mother of three who is about to launch a blog and coaching business around the idea of making pregnancy and birthing more pleasurable. We talked a lot about birth.

In her research she consulted with the brilliant Dr. Christiane Northrup. Dr. Northrup told her two things that I have not been able to get out of my head since. That has me up at 4:30AM this morning writing.

The first is that the way we give birth is the way we live our lives. Or is it the way we live our lives is the way we give birth. No matter. I'm still digesting that one.

The second is that the thing that makes pregnancy and delivery difficult for most women is fear.

Fear. I was afraid of that.

Fear, the great obstacle to overcome. How we choose to push past those fears, if we choose to, is how the process will unfold. I've been very fearful this week. It happens. There is no birth, no reinvention of any sort without that occurring. I know that when my fears set in I tend to push against them.

Again, I've never given physical birth. I'm not the expert. Dr. Northrup and my lunch companion are. But I know enough to understand there is a difference between pushing against and pushing through.

I also know that the only way to push past and through my fears is to surrender and not try and fight them. It sounds easier than it is. But I have a secret that I'm told they use in delivery rooms. Breathe. Really breathe. It makes the process, whatever you are birthing easier.

The Humor Of Fear

There's no getting away from it. Fear. We all have our own unique list of what it looks like. We have a job, we fear losing it. We lose a job, we fear never getting a new one. We have money, we fear it will disappear. We don't have money, we fear we'll never save a penny. We don't have a boyfriend or spouse and we fear we'll never have one. We have one and we fear breaking up or divorcing. We're fat. We fear never losing the weight. We lose the weight and we fear we'll get fat again.

It's a vicious cycle.


Fear creates worry. Worry is a waste of time. Nothing gets done when worry sets in. For some it can be debilitating. They take Xanax to make it through the day. My grandfather used to sit in his Barcalounger holding on to a pair of pale blue worry beads he had brought from Greece with him. That's how people dealt with worry in the days before pharmaceutical solutions. They played with a string of beads so they had something concrete to hold on to.



Fear can be looked at as a good thing. Fear is often the catalyst for change. The beginning of a decision to reinvent things.



Sometimes it can be used for distressing purpose. Terrorists use fear to try and stop what they don't like. The RNC has a new fundraising strategy aimed at manipulating fear of Socialism to raise money for the Republican party.


I can get pretty serious when my fears pop up their ugly little heads. I don't medicate and I don't take out the worry beads. A glass of wine doesn't hurt but I find humor the most effective.

Laughing at myself and at the absurdity of whatever my fears are at that moment feels a whole lot better than the fear. Working on my novel is a lot more productive than worrying it will never get published. Attending a networking event is going to get me a lot more new coaching clients than pulling out the worry beads. A quick visit to The Daily Show to see Jon Stewart's take on our political scene puts it in perspective, all through the use of a little laughter.

Laughter breaks up all that negative energy. It makes me see how silly I am being and how unproductive my worry has caused me to be. Worry doesn't make fear go away. Laughing won't either. But it gets me pointed in a much better direction. A new chapter. Finding a new coaching client. A new blog.

Slippery Patches

They're always there. Slippery patches. If you want change in your life they are bound to show up. Sometimes expected. Sometimes they catch you off guard.

Take Monday. I went for 3 mile walk in Central Park . The drives have been clean of snow for days so sneakers do just fine. My general route has me crossing West to East at the Reservoir. I noticed as I approached the track that it was still snow covered. I could have turned around and gone back the way I came. But I didn't. Even in my sneakers with no traction. The day was too glorious. Bright sunshine, blue sky and lots of still white snow on the trees and lawn.

But it did slow me down. That's what happens when things get a little slippery. You slow down. You try not to think about falling. You search out the parts that look a little shiny, the ones that are truly ice. You try to avoid those. You could slip on those. Fall. Hurt yourself . Worry you might not be able to get back up. Fear finds its way into what had been a pleasant, invigorating power walk listening to the Black Eye Peas.

As I navigated my way to the other side, catching myself more than once as my foot got away from me I thought about the fear I could let overtake me. Fear that could have me holding on to the tree branches that line the perimeter. The fear that used to paralyze me on a steep slope on Aspen Mountain. In one moment I would forget I knew how to ski. Too terrified to move, I would stop, look down and fear what would happen if the icy slope proved too much for me and I went spiraling out of control.

The same fear one encounters when reinventing. Fear of something going wrong, fear of failure or perhaps even fear of success. The fear never goes away. The slippery patches never disappear. It's just whether you choose to giggle at them as I did on my walk, demonstrate whose in charge or let the fear win. Your choice. But if you can't laugh, reinvention is not a route I recommend.