On Confidence: Trust Your Voice

A few weeks ago I told my daughter I wanted to put up wallpaper in the bathroom. She thought it was a terrible idea, she went on and on how really a bad idea it was so I didn’t. I wanted to put up the wallpaper, it was just a small area but I thought it would brighten it up the space, but her reaction made me think ‘well, maybe it will look bad. Why spend the money if its going to look awful.’ But I kept seeing the image in my head and it looked okay so I went to Home Depot and bought it. I put the roll at the door of the bathroom so I saw it every time I walked in just staring at me. Finally one morning I said just put the damn thing up if it looks bad take it back down.

I put it up and I loved it. It looked great for my first attempt and it did brighten up the space. I texted a picture to my daughter and she loved it. She said that was a really good decision. When she got home she raved about it more because pictures don’t give it true justice. I was  happy but disappointed. I was disappointed that I didn’t trust my own voice, my own gut when it has worked well for me before.

I noticed that the last few years I have not listened to my voice when I needed to choosing to either to ignore flashing red lights and proceed anyway or stop dead and do nothing when something needs to be done. I don’t come from a background of bad decisions. I pretty much made reliable decisions throughout my life and even if some were bad I was strong enough to fix them and move on. Now, however, I seem to hesitate and sometimes just outright freeze, just like I did with that wallpaper.

I wonder if my decisions  were easy to make in the past because they involved no risk where as now it seems everything I want to do involves some sort of risk. I will be fifty in two years and I know I am in midlife crisis. I’m confused and anxious as how I want to spend the rest of my time on this earth. In my head I have a vision of my life but right now my present is not matching so I feel anxious and I don’t want to make the wrong moves.

I don’t want to keep questioning if I should buy the damn wallpaper or not so I’m making myself listen to that inner voice that tells me to be brave because I think that is what I am missing now, my bravery. So dear reader if you are reading this and you are feeling the self-doubt in your own voice start exercising it more. Acknowledge your fear and do it anyway. Let your inner-voice scream inside of you. Trust it like you did before. Be Brave buy the damn wallpaper, the dress, invest in your own business, tell that guy you love him, make the plan to lose that weight…whatever it is TRUST YOUR VOICE.

Don’t let the noise of other people’s opinions drown out your inner voice. Steve Jobs