Saturday Morning - Fear is the Mind Killer

Okay, it’s not Saturday morning. In fact, I didn’t even do one last week while I was on the road. I’m going to blame this on moving and conventions, but I think I could probably stay on task if I turn this into a real thing.

So fear.

Fear is indeed the mind killer. It’s also the productivity killer, the income killer and the opportunity killer. The point is, fear is bad, okay.

Fear is the reason I didn’t show my portfolio to Wizards of the Coast two years before I actually ended up getting work on Magic.

Fear is what kept me from posting my Kickstarter back when I had a job.

Fear is what prevented me from drawing characters with real faces and feelings for nearly 10 years.

It’s like I’m looking at my shoes, asking my muse “hey, you wanna make some art sometime or whatever?” instead of just grabbing her by the hips and breaking into a tango. The fear of rejection and failure has the power to brutally argue against all my best instincts. But that’s okay. The fear isn’t going to go away. Instead, I’ve tried to use it to my advantage. When something makes me feel scared, I’ve been trying to lean into that thing rather than avoid it. Things worth doing, are scary. So the inverse must be, scary things have a pretty good chance of being worthwhile.

I guess we’ll see how that works out.

Under ideal circumstances, it’s easy to come up with excuses to not dig in on that project you’ve been dreaming of. But think, is it because you’re not in the mood? Or because deep down, you are afraid that it’s not going to come out right? I think Homer Simpson summed it up best…