On feeling the fear

and doing the thing anyway

I’m a fairly private person by nature and when I’m in writing mode I usually keep even more quiet. But when these words came through with unexpected passion and purpose the other week I felt like sharing them with you.

I’m also usually loathe to announce what I’m working on for fear the inspiration will suddenly vanish but I feel the time is ripe to let you to know that I’m writing a book about the power of journaling.

And my hope is that sharing these few lines of raw unedited prose might give you a glimpse into my love for journaling and what it has given me—a process and a practice that has the power to bring you these gifts…and more.

I want you to experience the richness and depth of life that is available to you right now.

I want you to know yourself intimately as you become more aware of who you are.

I want you to find the meaning and clarity and peace you yearn for.

I want you to feel deeply connected to your inner life and outer life.

I want you to value and honour yourself like never before.

I want you to show up and be there for all of it and all of you.

I want you to take your hand to the page and write your heart out and keep writing until you feel like you’ve got nothing left but love.

Journaling has been a big part of my journey for many years, helping me transform my experiences and my experience of life - for the better - so much so that I wanted to start teaching and sharing my experiences and knowledge of journaling with others.

Pre-Covid I started delivering journaling workshops to small groups of people, sharing tips and ideas and prompts to ignite and support people to practice. During Covid I coached a handful of beautiful women to journal their way on an individual basis. And last year I went deeper again with a group of female cancer patients over a 9 hour time frame. And then I delivered my first online Masterclass to a small group of women who got the most refined teaching from me to date, but it left me feeling flat and empty. (Side note: I have reflected on that experience and reaction a learnt a great deal which I will no doubt share with you down the track).

After all these years I had so much material, so much knowledge, years of practice but I felt I had exhausted myself and exhausted my options with what to do with it.

I didn’t want it to go to waste and I still wasn’t ‘done’ with it - something in me was still crying out to reach more people to inspire them to want to benefit from the transformational tool that journaling is.

I set about creating an e-book with clickable links, but a few weeks in I suddenly felt overwhelmed and uninspired. And then it dawned on me: an e-book was way too mechanical and not at all big enough to contain what I had to share.

So I made the switch to a good old Word Doc and 11,000 words on I am feeling like I am where I need to be with it. It took an accompanying Process Diary which has now reached 16,000 words to get me there though! Any writers or creatives or entrepreneurs out there will understand there’s always a fair amount of imposter syndrome and fear to deal with on the side ; /

But as Susan Jeffers so eloquently suggests with her bestselling book whose title just about sums up how to deal with that:

We have to feel the fear and do it anyway.

And that’s exactly what I’m doing.

It’s a journey…and one that I hope you will join me on : )

And please, any comments or questions or feedback about what I’ve shared today are welcome - be it about journaling, or imposter syndrome, or fear, or creativity, or anything that struck a chord - I’d love to hear from you.

With love, Gena xo