Strengthening the Fearless Muscle
Paris Letters started as a New Year's resolution to write three pages in my journal/workbook every day for a year. This journal writing experiment was the brain child of Julia Cameron and her book The Artist's Way. Writing daily led to inspired thought, which led to this big fat question:
How much money does it take to quit your job?
And that question led to a 100 little inspired ideas on how to do just that. I spent the year paring down and saving up. I ended the year having one suitcase of belongings, a decent savings and a one way ticket to Europe.
The rest you'll have to read over at Amazon.
In other news, I celebrated a big birthday recently. One of the loveliest gifts was this message from one of my favorite travel writers:
So he must have forgotten that time we were hiking and a snake slithered across our path. I started bawling my head off and insisted we prance very quickly back to the car. Because for me, if you've seen one snake you've seen them all. And those hills became a nest of serpent activity in my mind.
His words got me thinking about fearlessness.
Because I don't generally consider myself fearless. Even though there is evidence:
"I read your memoir prior to the the start of my journey. It was inspiring to see someone living fearlessly. I one day hope to travel to this magical city that you so clearly depicted. Until then, I will live vicariously through your letters." Michelle R.
And I thought again, "Who you talking 'bout Willis?"
Because the fearless thing didn't feel very fearless. It felt obvious. And it felt obvious because I had hashed out all my plans inside the pages of my journal.You know where I'm going with this, right?Whatever scary thing you may want to do, you will likely find it's not so scary once you write out the details of the plan day after day in a journal. Then you just tackle a few of those plans at a time. Genius. Easy. Obvious.
But what if you die and your relatives read your journal?
People actually fear this. I chuck my journals once I fill them.
The horror.
Yep. I do. I keep the plans and leave the babble.So if you're stuck on a dream that fills you with fear, tackle it by writing out the plans in a journal/workbook each day instead. Who knows, you might one day find yourself in the odd but wonderful situation of having great people call you fearless.
