you know that saying that goes, “dance like there’s nobody watching,” something something something? i can’t stand that saying. i can’t stand that saying because i simply cannot dance like there’s nobody watching, even if nobody is, in fact, watching. i cannot do anything as if there’s nobody watching, because i’m watching, and i’m somebody, and i don’t want to look like i don’t know what i’m doing, even in front of myself. this is why i refuse to do anything that i’m not already good at. this is why you’ll never see me play jai-alai or swim in open water or perform a chemistry experiment requiring safety goggles. this is why i have not yet and will not ever take a zumba class. this is why i will never ever ever limbo at a party.

i also can’t stand the saying that goes, “do something every day that scares you.” i spend the entirety of my days (and nights) avoiding like the plague things that scare me. things that scare me include running randomly into people who clearly do not like me, considering deeply whether the decisions i have made in my life have been completely erroneous, falling from the roof of a very high building, eating insects, and asking my mother for her opinion about my parenting.

[incidentally, dancing like there’s nobody watching scares me. strike two against dancing like there’s nobody watching. it’s just not gonna happen.]

but i will say one thing. this scares me. telling you what scares me, scares me. telling you that i’m afraid to fail scares me. being afraid to fail scares me. but from the little math i remember from college, it seems to me that being afraid of being afraid to fail is the equivalent of a double negative of fear of failing, meaning that i am really not afraid at all of failing, or, as the transitive property suggests, i’m really embracing my own success.

but this isn’t math. and now you know: writing about my being scared scares me.

and the thought of being scared like there’s nobody watching scares me. but i’m doing it anyway, dammit. because pretending not to be scared scares me more.

Published February 3, 2016