"Do the thing you fear"

I recently read this somewhere, and it has become my motto over the last couple of weeks. OK, maybe not do the thing you *fear* so much - I haven't been hanging out in dark alleys tempting evil to come get me, nor jumping off high bridges into the middle of the ocean - but it's been more like doing the things where I lack confidence. It's kind of liberating to face the things that are scary and "just do it", to take another well known phrase. Actually, maybe that should be my motto...it's a bit more realistic!

So...I've recently babysat a nine month old, helped with the kids last Sunday morning and have now signed up for a 6 week kids summer programme on Sunday mornings, since I've never really had much experience with kids. In Oxford, I not only learnt how to cook but summoned up the courage to do it for other people! On a slightly less pleasant note, there was a rat in my room overnight on Saturday and I had to deal with it (but confess I couldn't do it on my own and woke my flatmate Liz to ask her to help me!). It's dead now!

I'm looking forward to conquering some more of those small fears and realising that they aren't really such a big deal. I mean, what's the worst that can happen? Failure! I've failed before, and I'll fail again...might as well get practise at failing gracefully. But the really cool thing is that there will be a whole lot more successes and joy at having done new things this way, too. Bring it on!