Badassery Magazine December 2017 Issue 19 | Page 79

T here are a lot of women who would love to write a book. It’s constantly nag- ging at the back of your mind. You have a lot to share with the world, so why don’t you? What’s stopping you? What stops you from writing is fear. It comes in different fla- vours, but it’s all made of the same stuff. Fear of success, rejec- tion, you’re not qualified enough, persecution, you don’t have enough to say, you won’t know how to say it, you’re not ‘a writer’ so you’re going to screw it up and the list of fears goes on. These fears usually started in our childhood. To trace your fears ask yourself, what is the worst review you could get on your book? If some- one absolutely hated it, what would they say? After you’ve written that down ask yourself who in your child- hood used to say or imply those things to you? Who (of the people you know or have known) would you be terrified would read this book and give you shit about it? Now for the moment of truth… Just how full of shit were they? Describe 3-5 moments where you demonstrated the opposite of whatever they accused you of. For bonus points, count how many people you can think of who told you the opposite. Do this for each accusation. For example: “You’re stupid.” A) Pulled straight A’s B) Speak 3 languages C) Running my own business Bonus points: 11 in 20 seconds and that’s off the top of my head. Hmm… 1 person saying I’m stupid, versus 11 saying I’m not. I wonder if I should ask for help from the audience here to choose the correct statement? I don’t have a degree or PhD This really pisses me off. Waving a paper around does not auto- matically make you qualified. A lot of these people with these papers go off to be – here’s the kicker – trained on the job. Life experience always has been and always will be a far better teacher than any university. You can supplement life experience with degrees, but degrees are not a substitute for life experience. To give you an example, I knew a girl who suffered from DID (Dis- sociative Identity Disorder). She spent 3 hours in a room explain- ing her concerns to 3 78