05/30/2026
"I want to describe a scene in which I learned a whole lot about fear, including the sense that fear is an intimate emotion, and that what we fear the most is connected to who we already are at the core of our lives.
The moment in which fear becomes almost overwhelming begins backstage in a theater where over 500 people are waiting for an event to begin. I am one of several presenters. And I’m expecting to be the last one to speak. And therefore, imagining that I have plenty of time to decide what I’m going to present. What I really want to do is tell a story that I had only recently found and had not really prepared to tell. The truth is that I don’t rehearse stories before I tell them, I read them or listen to them, and let them inhabit me, usually for quite a while before I ever tell them. While I was still casually considering what story I should tell, the host of the event suddenly came up and said, “something has happened, I’m going out and I’m going to introduce you first.”
I suddenly became flooded with fear, almost paralyzed by it, not simply because I felt unprepared in the moment, but also because something in me insisted that I tell the story that I also felt I had not completely learned. In what seemed like barely a moment I was on stage, still feeling deeply fearful, still feeling unprepared, and definitely feeling that I might not measure up to the occasion. And then something in me that I now realize knew more about me and what I should be doing than I did, began telling the story regardless of my fears and insecurities."
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