I started a new job yesterday. I’m working alongside a dear friend who is the executive director of our local CASA (Court Appointed Special Advocates) agency to help increase their footprint in our local community through advertising, mult-media and other stuff too. Essentially, the stuff I’ve learned over the past ten years used to promote my own work and the work I’ve done in the past for my concert series, I’ll translate into the world of non-profit and community outreach. How exciting.
Also. How terrifying.
I can see what’s happening up in my brain. I can clearly see how my internal dialogue is working around the clock to explain to me how I cannot possibly succeed and why changing my mind and going back to musical obscurity mixed with housekeeping is really what I was meant to do all along.
I see it. It’s no secret that I do it all the time. Some call it the art of “arguing in favor of your limitations.”
Arguing in favor of your limitations is a special special kind of hell where you actually choose all your good good reasons for being generally powerless and incapable in an effort to snuff out whatever foolish spark of inspiration or motivation or inclination you had to believe yourself capable of doing something outside the ordinary or building something bigger than the current house you call your life.
So silly. But silly how? Silly in that you like how weak you feel (and by ‘you’ I mean ‘me’)? OR silly that you might let your mind venture into a place where you entertain the notion of something cooler?
That is where I find myself, my friends. At a crossroads between my limitations and my potential. And the good thing is that I’ve been here before and I’m willing to fight for something cool that might make my future more interesting instead of fighting for my past which will lead to predictable results.
So I need a little fire power so my better self can reload her weapon (imaginary non-violent weapon). I need to remember those times when going back was not an option and showing up as my powerful self was the only choice available to me. Here it goes:
Childbirth. The only way through it is through it. ‘Tis a stark reality to face on some unknown day at some unknown hour in some place where they can hold your hand and speak encouragement all they want, but you’re the only person there called to the task at hand. Sorry sister, no amount of arguing for how you can’t do it is going to change anything about this. You’re in it. Might as well own it. I did it three times. I never felt like an earth goddess or connected to the energy of the universe’s core or anything, but I did quit saying, “I can’t do this.” I learned that, indeed, I could do it and I did. I have three sons to prove it.
This one time, in South Korea, I was helping lead a mission team of volunteers from my church to put on an English immersion Vacation Bible School. We had planned and prepared so much prior to our departure. We had it down to a science until, the night before the program was about to start, we were informed that the plan had changed and that we’d be leading the whole group of 300+ attendees with a program we had NOT planned for. I’ll never forget the 12 of us huddled together in a room all night scrambling to re-work the material, figure out how we were going to pull it off and then delivering. No time to question whether we could do it. We just did. It was fudging amazing and out of this world miraculous that we just did it.
At the end of 2019, you might remember how I recorded two new studio albums essentially back to back within the course of 6 weeks. I remember suffering a real deep crisis in confidence during record number one. THe “I can’t do this” voice was really demanding to be let in until it dawned on me that I did not have the luxury of quitting. Instead I was obligated to admit my fear, clarify the goals and get the fuck to work. That same fear crept in on record number two when my producers told me the band was showing up to play on studio day one. I don’t know why that freaked me out, but it did. And I had to tell myself, “Hopie, I hate to break it you, but this is not amateur hour. You have no choice but to walk in that room like you know exactly what you’re doing like you’ve done this a hundred times before. That’s the only way to make your dream record come true.”
And then there was this one time in Madrid when I was leading a group of high school students on a tour through Spain and we were all waiting in the lobby waiting for the bus or something when this shifty street hippie walked into the lobby of the hotel looking all shifty and stole my student’s cell phone (she had just put it down on the coffee table in front of her). I thought, “The only adult chaperone in charge of taking care of these students is you, my friend.” So I chased the street hippie out the hotel, down the street and screamed at him to give me the cell phone back in my Spanish teacher voice. The good thing was I think he was high so he wasn’t moving that fast and wasn’t thinking so clear so he just looked at me and gave it back. DUNBAR!!!!
Those are the things I’m using for fuel to combat against the self-doubt. Babies, South Korea, Recording, Cellphone. Babies, South Korea, Recording, Cellphone. Over and over I remind myself that I’ve been here before and I’ve lived from a place of power and not fear.
Babies, South Korea, Recording, Cellphone. My own version of a healthy cognition test and I passed. They said they’ve never seen anyone do the test the way I did it. Some people get the babies thing, but the South Korea thing? THe South Korea thing is very tricky and not a lot of people do it or remember it and I did both. Most people can’t do both and I did.
Anyhoo, please don’t argue for your limitations. Your limitations are not on your side. They are not a cool kid on the bus who is going to reward you by calling your name and asking you to sit next to them. And if they do, you’re in trouble. You’re not safe, you’re in trouble. Because once Limitations has you on their team, they’ll work a little harder and a little harder to convince you that other stuff is out of your reach as well. Limitations is not a good friend. They don’t want you to be your best self. They want you all to themselves so they feel good. Remember that.
Babies, South Korea, Recording, Cellphone.