Fear

April 30, 2005

April 29, 2005

I think I should create a page titled: “Maria’s Battles in Running.” Because man do I learn a lot when I’m challenging myself. You see…I REALLY dislike running. Why? Because it’s hard. I get scared when my heart rate is too fast and sweat starts blurring my eyesight.

So today while I could feel my heart overtaking my throat on the treadmill…I was thinking that one of the reasons why I’ve got such a strong personality is because of moments like this: moments when I stared fear in the face.

I’ll let all of you in on a bit of history…when I was younger, I was very insecure. In high school, most people can’t believe that I was bullied. I actually got into a couple fights with people I didn’t know. I woke up every day scared to go to school. After my first pageant win, I was scrutinized and intimidated by many people. I felt that all my hard work to gain respect in my community was overshadowed by rumors and bashing. In college, I spent the first two years commuting to Davis because I was scared to leave home because I came from a large, tight-knit family.

The point here? My point is that while I was bullied at school, I never changed schools. After horrible fights, I walked onto campus next day with my head high. After my first pageant, I took the energy people distracted me with and I went on to win more national and international titles. After moving to Davis, I began exploring other opportunities to travel to more distant places…more recently to Europe all by myself!

So if you are scared of something…the only way to overcome it is to do it! You can’t overcome your fear of flying if you don’t fly. You can’t overcome your fear of running, if you don’t run. And! You can’t overcome your fear of failure, if you don’t allow yourself to experience failure. Fear is Paralyzing.