do one thing every day that scares me

For as long as I’ve had this goal on my 43T list, it’s been something that I don’t remind myself of very often. Perhaps one scary thing to do would be to write out this goal on a piece of paper and post it in a place where I see it every day; then I’d have to think about it.

Something good, though, is that I’ve been taking risks a lot more often in the last few weeks. I guess the new year will bring that out in a person.

Some things I’ve done:

—Scheduled all the final payments for my student loan. I decided to pay $500 a month until it’s gone. It’d be easier just to keep paying the $50 minimum every month, but the idea of having debt really weighs on me. I just want it gone.

—Started greeting more people at work on a daily basis. Tried to be more talkative. Started conversations with co-workers who usually don’t get more than nods and smiles from me.

—Began accepting that I’m probably going to live in a completely different place this time next year. It’ll be a good move, but a big and scary one.

—Started doing weights and other strength-training exercises again.

—There are two parts to my job: the part I like is the design editing, proofing, and general coordination of the putting-together of Arabic picture books and novels for a company I like to call The Big S. The other part of my job is taking on translation projects; I do this when there isn’t anything immediately due for The Big S. It combines all of my worst skills: promising things to clients, estimating costs, estimating deadlines, and asking people for favors. Today I took on two translation jobs. This was scary. One is due back on Monday, and the other is due back next Thursday. The other scary thing I did in relation to this was admit that I am not particularly good at that part of the job and don’t want to continue it after the publishing-related part of my job comes to an end. It’s one thing to take on a challenging job and get better at it. It’s another to torture yourself needlessly with a job that doesn’t come naturally to you and that you are very, very sure you don’t like. Especially when you know there are many more jobs out there that you can do, and do well. And enjoy, for that matter.

- I admitted to myself, and to Adam, that this year (since my 25th birthday last May) started on a social high, but pulled me further back into social anxiety as the year went on. Last spring I was still teaching ESL, and I was going out a lot. Then I got promoted, and I was on a business trip with some delightful co-workers of mine for two weeks. And then I got promoted again and wound up in the very quiet job I’m in now. I have friends, but I don’t see them much, and I’ve faltered on keeping in touch with out-of-town and out-of-the-country friends. I haven’t gone out with work friends in a couple months. I don’t practice any social skills during the day - just business communication—and I’m introverted enough that I need to really keep that up or I’ll forget how to do it. It’s gotten so bad that the prospect of asking a co-worker to lunch scares me into bringing lousy sandwiches every day. I haven’t been like this for a couple years, and I’ve got to find a way to climb back out of it.

I conquered a big fear this weekend: I took out a draft of a novel that I last worked on a couple of years ago (November 2003) and evaluated it objectively. I had high hopes for what I’d think of it. I remembered that the concept and plot were really interesting (read: twisted and BIZARRE) and that I’d populated it with some very well-loved characters I created many years ago. Basically, I would have been crushed if it had been a bad draft. I wanted it to be something I could work with.

So I took a deep breath and opened it on Saturday morning. It took me a while to read. I finally finished it up late on Sunday night. I’ve got a couple pages of notes on things that need to be improved. But it is definitely something I can work with. And, even better, something I want to work with. I’m really excited about getting this to some sort of final state and submitting an outline and some sample chapters to agents to see if there’s any interest.

Today: work stuff. I absolutely HAVE to contact a new contractor and get him to work on a project I have. Why am I always so scared to ask people to do things for me? And it’s not even like I’m asking a favor—it’s paid work!

1. Ask a co-worker to lunch.

2. Write a letter to my AP English teacher. (I graduated in ‘98. I heard he’s retiring this year. I spent a very painful school year trying so hard to get his approval and acclaim. I got it, occasionally. But he gave the big end-of-the-year award to three students who were not me, and the sting from that was difficult to calm. I still fear the man a little, or, at least the idea that I’ve created of him.)

3. Quit lurking on MySpace. Actually write one of the high school buddies I’ve found on there (so many of them still live in town! Sheesh) and see if they’d like to catch up over drinks or coffee.

4. Organize a dinner party.

5. Get my credit report.

6. Watch a movie that’s critically acclaimed but rumored to be very disturbing, e.g. Midnight Cowboy or Taxi Driver.

7. Tell an out-of-town friend I’m absolutely going to visit her this summer and then don’t break the promise.

8. Get rid of old clothes and shoes I’ve been hanging onto out of stubborn nostalgia.

9. Go through boxes of high school and college stuff at my parents’ house. Be ruthless with what goes into the trash bag.

10. Start a themed blog. Share the address with people other than just my online friends!

Monday: Helped my neighbor out with her wardrobe. She’d just bought two new suits, and she needed another woman’s opinion on how they looked and how they fit. She caught me in the parking lot in front of our apartment building as I was getting home from work on Monday evening and asked if she could come over later for some suit assistance. If this had happened a couple years ago, I would have come up with a way to need to go somewhere that evening. But I was neighborly - as one should naturally be in such a situation - and told her, yes, of course. She came over, her suits looked good, and we had a nice chat. I think she’s lonely. Still, my initial reaction to her question was fear. Why? When someone’s asking me to help her out, there’s no possibility of rejection. So am I freezing up simply because it’s a form of human contact? Sheesh. Sometimes I wonder how I function at all.

Tuesday: Errgh… can’t think of anything.

Wednesday (today): Volunteered to take on some jobs at work that I don’t usually do, mostly out of fear that I’ll screw something up. But I’ve been in this position since last summer, and it’s time that I prove I can manage one of the company’s more complex translation projects without screwing it up. Of course, now that I’ve accepted a Slovak project and 50 pages of German legal documents, I’d better NOT screw them up.

(I haven’t been keeping up with this very well. Yikes!)

I tried to be more social at work yesterday. I talked a bit to the company president (who never ever initiates conversation with me). I talked with my boss about movies and music and how I have no physical talents (can’t wink, can’t whistle, etc.). I discussed with my freelancer the ins and outs of making vegan chili at 1 AM (he had recognized that he had made HUGE mistakes two days in a row and so tried to win me back over by bringing me vegan chili for lunch. It was deliciouus, but even better was that he went a whole day without screwing anything up, work-wise).

The big thing, though, was that I went to the other side of the office to socialize. And, also, I was assertive about my weekend plans—my friend Danielle and a couple of other work folk are supposed to get together sometime this weekend, but I realized she didn’t have my cell phone number and I didn’t have hers. So, I did the actual NORMALLY SOCIAL HUMAN thing and asked another work friend for her number and called her yesterday evening. Left a message. Still don’t know anything about the weekend plans, but at least if nothing materializes it won’t be for my lack of trying.

Also, after many years of gently berating myself for not writing enough in my online journal, and trying too hard to come up with a great entry every time I sat down to write, and getting overwhelmed by all the things I hadn’t written about… I’ve actually been updating my Livejournal every day. I’m up to five days in a row now: March 27, 28, 29, 30, and 31. I’m going to try to keep this up until April 14. That’s the day we go to Vancouver; as it’s our anniversary trip, I’m not taking my computer with me.

I got a haircut! I’ve been putting that off for about a month now. I get nervous about haircuts because, for one thing, they involve putting your appearance into a stranger’s hands and trusting said stranger to make it better, and, for another thing, they involve making strained small talk with said appearance-improving stranger. I’m hesitant to ask the stylist much about his or her life because I always imagine them rolling their eyes about the question they hear a couple times a day every day they’re at work. One day, maybe I’ll have a nice cocktail before I go to the salon and be loosened up enough to ask the stylist something really strange.

Also, it seems like every time I do start engaging the stylist in small talk, someone next to us turns on a hair dryer and the conversation is lost.

I went to the cheap salon today. I get my highlights done at the fancy salon, and once I got a $55 haircut there, but when I’m just getting a couple inches shorn off my long hair, there’s really no reason to pass up the $13 haircut at Hair Cuttery.

Went to the workout room at my apartment complex. I used to go all the time, but then I got out of the habit. Even though I kept up my exercise routine pretty well, I completely lost the nerve it takes to work out in front of others.

It turned out that getting my nerve back didn’t take long at all. The worst part was the few seconds before I opened the door of the room - it was dark inside and I couldn’t tell how many people were in there. I had one bad experience there about a year ago - I was riding the exercise bike there when the only other person there was a guy who obviously had nowhere else to go and was basically setting up camp by the weights for the night. He had ordered pizza and had a change of clothes. Yeah. He didn’t bother me - just talked on his cell phone for the 30 minutes I was there - but it was creepy, and really, I should have left as soon as I felt uncomfortable.

Yesterday, though, I went in the morning and everything was fine. The workout room was in more disrepair than it had been in the past. Two of the treadmills didn’t work at all, and the one that did work was being used by a girl who was talking on her cell phone and walking at a slower pace than people walk in the supermarket. I tried the stairclimber first, but it was as bad as I remembered it. Finally, I hopped on the elliptical and did 30 minutes, then switched to doing crunches for a while, and then left. Scaryness averted, and my muscles felt great.

—Gone running a couple times. I used to run 20 – 30 miles a week, but I got away from it, and it’s been tough to get started again. Once I get out there, and I get past the first big hill on the way out of my apartment complex, I remember how much I love running and wonder why I spent a whole season avoiding it.

—Instigated conversation with my co-workers. I’m tired of being that quiet girl who sits in the corner.

—Helped out my always-stressed co-worker Nancy by answering the phones for a whole day.

—Tried to be a more confident-sounding supervisor to the freelancers I manage. I have to keep reminding myself that it is my job to supervise them and to give them orders. Nobody’s going to get mad at me for taking charge, even if I have to occasionally be forceful about it. Somebody’s going to get mad at me if I don’t take charge, though.

The big scary things, though, are the ones I’m still not doing. This is a problem. Basically, if I don’t call and e-mail some friends, stat, I’m going to be adding to my sadly long list of people I used to know.

Today I had an actual conversation with the president of the company I work for. He and I are usually pretty silent with each other. I’d even gotten out of the habit of saying good morning, so talkikng to him today was very strange and nervewracking. We talked about how we both have frighteningly accurate memories for small and vaguely useless details.

I also did push-ups tonight. 20 of ‘em.