Say what?!? That's my fear?

It's weird when you live your life according to a certain belief only to realize that in reality even you were blinded to what the real belief was. This morning a realization hit me as I was driving home from work. It was like all the sudden the curtain was drawn and I could see into the deep hidden places inside of me. 

So let me try and unpack this for you for a minute. You see tonight I am driving with a friend to Columbus Ohio where tomorrow I will race in my first obstacle course 5k. Back in the middle of January when I signed up for this adventure there was some fear but now that I'm at the day before the race it's almost become a terror. For the past week and a half I have been certain that my fear was failure. Anyone that I talked to about the race I told them things like "I'm not going to be able to do it", "what if I fail?", or "I'm certain I'm going to die in Ohio." All valid comments and concerns if I was struggling with fear of failure yet it isn't failure I fear it's success. Yep I'm not afraid to fail because I know that somewhere inside of me is a beast who will conquer whatever I face. Yet somehow that beast inside me gets overrode so many times by the coward inside of me that dreads success. How exactly can can fear of success be masqueraded as fear of failure? How can I be so determined that nothing life or anyone throws at me will destroy me when I'm trying to destroy myself? It seems like such a paradox but that exactly how I've lived my life determined that no one or nothing was going to hold me back except myself. 

Funny that all this came from a comment that a good friend of mine said yesterday when we were discussing how the online dating was going for me. A few years ago I sat down and wrote out a list of qualities and attributes that I wanted in any future man that I might date. Since then those have been my guideline as far as dating goes. Yesterday while my close friend, Rachel, and I were talking about how no one that showed interest in dating me came even close to meeting my list. As we talked she turned to me and said, "so you want to be in a relationship but at the same time you keep yourself in a place where that's not going to happen." Yep exactly I said thinking it was my fear of failure that was keeping me from dating. Yet this morning I realized that part of my life is also being dictated by my fear of success. You see I didn't just make a list of things that I'd like in a man I made a list of unattainable qualifications that set me up to never have that relationship I desperately desire. Once again showing me how my fear of failure in dating and ending up being the "crazy cat lady" is really ultimately about fearing being successful in a relationship. 

As I start to pray through this newest revelation and seek God on how to heal this area of my life I know that there is more to this fear of success. I know that it touches areas of my life that I haven't even realized yet. I'm certain that my fear of success is attached to at least one of my core beliefs about myself and that it's in the healing of those beliefs that my freedom from keeping myself in failure mode will break. I know that this is going to be a journey and that it's not going to be easy or pretty. I don't know what this road is going to look like or what might be around the corner. There is one thing I do know though and that is tomorrow instead of being determined to fail I'm going to allow the beast inside of me to thrive! It's time to break free from the chains and beliefs that have been holding me back for so many years.