Let It Go

So, last night I decided to promote my blog by creating a page for it on Facebook and inviting a bunch of friends to like it.  It was a very bittersweet moment for me…both exciting and frightening.  It was exciting because I knew I’d be getting my writing out there for others to see and potentially receiving some positive feedback.  …But it was frightening because my blog is basically my soul.  Being a shy person who is pretty guarded of her emotions and very untalented at speaking, my writing became a way to freely express myself without fear of judgment—the very fear that I think makes me so shy and fearful of speaking.  The writing that I post on my blog is basically an outpouring of my soul.

Before I started revealing my blog to people I know, it didn’t seem like I was really putting myself out there because truly only a few people ever looked at my posts—and they mostly were complete strangers.  But now it’s different.  I’m vulnerable.  Vulnerable to judgment by people I actually know, and since my work is an outpouring of my soul, my very being is vulnerable.  It’s like putting my soul into a huge glass display case and displaying it right in the middle of Times Square for anyone to look and see inside.  So, as I clicked the “invite” button for my Facebook page, I inwardly cringed a bit and my heart beat faster.   Questions and insecurities raced through my head: Will they like my work?  Will they hate it?  Will they think I’m crazy?  Have I showed too much of myself?  Will it change what these people think about me (in a negative way) and make them shun/dislike me (either secretly or publicly)?

…But then I thought to myself, forget worrying about what other people will think of you.  If after reading my blog someone decides he/she doesn’t  like me or thinks I’m crazy, then that’s completely fine.  Because in the end it isn’t what others think about me that counts, it’s what I think about myself. 

This made me think of a quote by Dr. Seuss that really resonates with me: “Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don’t matter and those who matter don’t mind.”  Also, since I just got re-reading The Scarlet Letter, I somehow related my situation to Hester’s.  Her strength  and steadfast determination to not be afraid to show the world who she was—even her flaws, scarlet “A” and all—now that’s inspirational.  “Be true!  Be true!  Be true!” Nathaniel Hawthorne states toward the end of   The Scarlet Letter, and this is definitely something Hester always did and something we all should do.  Don’t ever try to be someone you’re not because the person you truly are is so unique, so beautiful—and again, as Dr. Seuss would say, “There’s no one alive who is Youer than You.”

I guess basically what I want to convey through all my writing is optimism: optimism in the beauty and wonder of life and love.  Because after all, the world is beautiful, life is beautiful, and therefore you are beautiful.