Hello people. It's been a while since I've written anything, blog-wise. Life has been a bit of a challenge recently, but I'm not going to go into that. Suffice to say, I'm glad 2016 is over. I've learned a few things about myself and others, but it'll take me some time to fully process what that might mean.
Towards the end of last year I was invited to joint the Niume blogging community. At first I was really flattered and I even earned some money from it. I shared a couple of my old blogs from here and 2 of them were chosen to be featured, which was a great honour. But I soon began to realise that my blog doesn't really fit in. Most of the other blogs seem to be about sharing recipes, photographs or travel features. They have a rule that the blog must contain a minimum of 5 lines and the majority of them stick to the minimum, which makes my blogs appear quite verbose. Well to be fair, I guess they are, but I write as I speak, which is quite a lot.
So I stopped contributing.
But this picture popped into my Facebook memories this morning and is challenging me. I realised I was scared of what would happen if I continued to contribute when I didn't seem to 'fit in'. Which was crazy really as they invited me to join in the first place, which means that they must have felt that I had something to contribute.
2016 didn't turn out as I expected. I had it all planned out that it would be a year of celebration, when I would be continuing my adventures. I did have some adventures, but a few of them were eithe,r not on my list, or didn't go to plan. I literally have scars to prove it for a couple of them. But instead of embracing the challenge, I let it rob me of my confidence and left me fearful about doing anything in case it goes wrong.
I'm still feeling a bit cautious, but, as of today, I'm choosing to
not let it stop me living life and having adventures. I could see the Nuime blog as an opportunity to try something new, or just take the chance that what I write will continue to be well received.
Who knows? But I'm going to take a leap of faith and try not to let the fear of what might happen, stop me from trying to achieve what could.
Isabel Johnstone. 2017 ©
Photographs courtesy of:-
https://pixabay.com/en/achieve-fluent-adventure-barrier-1822503/
http://ow.ly/UhA2308E1JH
