Monday, June 05, 2006

Overthinking It

For a moment, I consider that I am simply too old to be standing with a foot suspended over the abyss of the unknown. On the verge of leaning forward, about to shift the weight to that outstretched foot, confident that the resultant free-fall will be an escapade of the highest order. I have been there, and I have done that. Thirty years ago, that expectation of adventure was richly rewarded. There may have been accompanying bumps, bruises, a compound fracture or two….but they always healed quickly, and always the golden nugget of knowledge, of experience, was squirreled away into memory.

Perhaps there are, at last, too many of those little nuggets stored in the cupboards and closets of my mind. They are stacked to the rafters and oozing out under the doors and around the hinges; no longer golden, but turned to dross. Unrewarded risks, confident forays into mud or mire, heedless wagers placed on losing horses… They mock me; they haunt me. They drag me down. To safety. To uncertainty. To paralysis.

All I can do is strap on the blinders…allow no look back, nor to the side, nor too far ahead. Certainly no further ahead than the next footfall. Just make myself keep moving, and I will get There. And once I am There, the fear, the restraint, the immobility will be pushed aside by the process of contriving to make it from day to day…the simple groundwork of success.

3 comments:

Robbie said...

I'm not an adrenaline junky. I don't sky-dive or bungee jump. However, after reading this I realized one of my biggest fears is to stop having challenges to face. Life sounds too dull, for me, if I fell into a safe rut.

You'll do great!! I'm super excited for you. :-)

emmapeelDallas said...

Just look forward. I'm approaching a similar abyss, and this is what I tell myself, too...easy to say, but hard to do, I know.

And you're NOT TOO OLD! Definitely not.

Judi

Cynthia said...

You're dead on target about what has to be done, and to echo Judi, You're not too old! For me, facing those everyday fears is a constant challenge, but just facing them is a reward in and of itself.