My Biggest Fear

My biggest fear is failure. It always has been and it always will be.

And because I like to torture myself, I think it’s fun to present myself with new ways to fail all the time. Like for instance this comedy festival I’m heading to on Wednesday. I just now checked out the official rules of the competition to see what it’s it all about (I knew the gist, but was sparing myself the details for anxiety reasons) and I learned that after round one of competition only 24 comedians get to move on to the next round.

In round two every comedian has to do two new sets of all new material. Round three it gets cut to 12 and one five minute set.

Only six move onto the finals and one ten minute set.

And it has to be new material every night. And the lump in my throat just got even bigger.

I grew up being a crazy competitive kid and have honestly competed in almost every sport possible at some point in my life: track, basketball, golf, swimming, dance, soccer, softball, volleyball… blah blah the list goes on, you get what I’m saying here.

But I never thought I would find myself in my late twenties competing in a festival of telling jokes. Getting on stage, grabbing a mic, and then doing my best to make the people laugh. How weird is that? It’s weird. It’s so weird. I can’t even describe to you how nervous I am simply typing this.

And yet also how excited it makes me. That ten year old asshole inside of me is screaming yes, you’re finally being competitive again, finally! I suddenly want to break out my old converse sneakers and my gold #22 chain necklace and do my athlete strut. That strut when you just get off the bus from a long ride to Grand Island and know damn well when you walk into their gym you’re going to beat them and so you’re feeling pretty confident in your sweet Adidas travel-suit with your headphones in and gold chain necklace on, that strut.

*Fun fact: I used to listen to Bone Thugs on repeat before every game, Thuggish Ruggish was one of my favs. 

Thug-Tay was so hardcore it hurt. I need some of that unwarranted confidence back in my life this week. Like my favorite child muscle-tanks always said, no fear. No fear allowed ever.

This week is going to be nutty. Send your good-luck positive vibes my way if you wouldn’t mind, I’m going to need them.

What’s your biggest fear? Tomorrow’s prompt: My Favorite Vacation…