Scared

Is there anything in life that scares you? Something that makes you loose sleep? Something that occupies your mind, making you question if your doing everything possible? If you know what scares you what are you doing about it? Do you constantly push it out of sight hoping that it goes away or do you acknowledge the fear and let it pull you in the right direction?

There have been things in my life that I have been scared of but with a little practice or guidance I am able to conquer those fears with some effort. There was a time that getting up in front of people to talk scared me but I am at a place now that I actually love to share a story in front of an audience. There was a time where I cared WAY to much what people thought of me and in exchange gave them to much power over my choices. I then realized how much this didn't make sense and how much energy I wasted trying to please everyone and not myself. There was also a time when I was scared to race in endurance events for the shear idiotic mentality that if I didn't win people would think I was a fraud. The funny thing is the second I committed to just doing my best my results skyrocketed.

There is however one fear that scares me more that anything and is something that I battle with daily....Not being a good dad or husband. I made a commitment to myself a long time ago that when the time came in my life that I would go all in with the family I was blessed to have. I knew from my upbringing that family is the one thing that matters the most in the world. Jobs, friends, hobbies, thoughts, homes, cars, etc...come and go but family is the one thing that 9 out of 10 times is our foundation.

What scares me is that I will fail them over their life. Not in any specific pattern or way but that I will loose them to small decisions that didn't support the daily growth of our family unit. I don't want to be that dad that in 30 years my kids say "dad I wish you came to more events" or "dad I wish you gave me more advice in life" or " dad I wish you where just around more". I also don't want to be the husband that chose selfish personal acts over the life long commitment I gave to continuing to build my relationship with my wife. My mind constantly works in over drive towards the next big goal to accomplish in my life and I typically have to self evaluate what is worth the effort or not. These are thoughts that scare me daily and push me to not be an over bearing dad but a dad who is always there for them.

Seeing your kids accomplish goals they have set in place and knowing at some point you had a piece in that drive is one of the greatest experiences we can have. I used to think that money, material items, business success and race placement where the keys in life. Over the years I have realized that seeing my wife and kids succeed and the smiles on their face is priceless. The first group of items will always be there for the taking with the right paradigms in life but seeing your kid smile or have them say "daddy...a face is a home for smiles" is something that I will forever seek out and hold onto.

What scares you?