Conquering Your Fear

By: Rabia Tirmizey

If I was to list down the number of ‘my firsts’ I have thought a lot about, my first ever article would probably top that list. The reason why I kept on procrastinating seeing my name first time in print was because I wanted to see it with the most perfect article. The big question was what to write about. The first thing that came to my mind was to write about something that I am good at or have closely been working on. This was followed by the million dollar question that what is my area of expertise. By virtue of having worked in the financial industry for the last four years (probably the years that one would have been better off staying away from this industry!) I thought for a while that maybe this should be my first piece of writing. I grew excited and started penning down my take on the current economic situation, what the last few years have been like and what can be expected in the future.  Having written down a few lines, I realized that almost everyone already knows about the ongoing recessionary environment and writing about it would mean reminding them about it.

Hence I was back to my original predicament. Racking my brain, I must have followed with writing on various topics under the sun: An independent working female’s views on life, living away from dear  motherland, cricket, politics, travelling, food (I am a major foodie), religion etc. etc.  Numerous half-finished pieces and hundreds of cups of tea and coffee later (obviously not in a single day), I realized that there is no such thing as ‘the perfect article’! Since perfection actually is a relative term.

What seems the most perfect piece of writing, painting, cuisine, or movie to one person might have weaknesses in someone else’s opinion.  However, what matters is how sincere you have been in your effort and if you actually like what you are writing (or painting / cooking / making).  If you do, well there should be no stopping you. The most important thing is conquering your fear of coming out in the open and inviting feedback to your creation, which could be praise as well as criticism. If its praise, you are good to go. If not, even better! Criticism and negative feedback can teach you like nothing else can.

Now that I am done writing, I realized maybe this could qualify as my first article!  Well, what better way to find out if it was worth it or not then by actually sharing this?