Sean D. Francis

A thousand fearful images and dire suggestions glance along the mind when it is moody and discontented with itself. Command them to stand and show themselves, and you presently assert the power of reason over imagination. -Sir Walter Scott

Day Eight: Putting skin in the game

Teetering on the edge of finishing this little project.  Nine days are flying by and has made me aware of just how far I really have to go.  Knocking a few bricks out of the wall of my social anxiety has been difficult but is really only symbolic of the things I need to do on a daily basis.  I’m not writing a summary just yet, but as I come to the close, I can’t help but ruminate upon the issues that vex me.

I sort of had day eight already planned out on what I needed to accomplish.  I’ve had a short story that I should have finished a month ago but kept finding reasons not to.   I was suffering the exact thing that Ira Glass is talking about in this video.

In my mind, the story was going to be fantastic and multi-layered, deep and properly plotted with great creepiness.  It was going to be something that would knock the socks off of the people who enjoy good horror stories.  As I wrote on it, each sentence was an indicator that it was going to fall short.  I loved the idea of the story so much that part of me was trying to tuck it away and write it another day, a day when I was better.  If you try, there is a chance you might fail, and failing is bad.  We should fear failure, right? Wrong.  Failure is natural, failure is good, failure is progress.  I submitted a flash fiction piece to a crappy little magazine no one heard of and it got rejected.  Along with the rejection was a critique of my use of dialog and speech patterns.  That was something I could cling to as an element to try to improve.  Failure allows for evolution of skill.

The eighth day I set out to finish that story, knowing it was going to fall short.  When I posted that I completed it a friend offered to do a gentle edit.  I initially balked.  I figured I’d just post the story to the blog and call it done and move on.  I mean having someone else read it and possibly suggest alterations… dare I say it was frightening?  No, it wasn’t frightening, it was just uncomfortable.  What if he suggests changes that dramatically improve it?  What does that say about me?  Why didn’t I know to implement the changes he suggested?  Bloody angst.

I released it.  I just went with the flow.  I realize how hard it is to actually read someone else’s work, someone you know, and try to suggest improvements, point to areas that need to be clarified, to assist with the pacing of events.  At times I know my word choices aren’t correct, or tend to be overdramatic.  (Me?! Overdramatic?! Never!!)  His offer to take this on and do even a gentle edit is an onus and one I know he is doing to help me improve.

I also set aside to day to focus on another area that needs improvement.  Financial improvement.  Now I know what I am about to say is going to get all the financial gurus up in arms but I took out a large loan against my 401k.  My job has profit sharing which is sizable but it goes right into the 401k.  I never actually get any lump sum cash in pocket from my job, so I don’t have the opportunity to catch up on anything.  And due to tax problems from my last job in regards to my severance package, the IRS has collected my past two tax returns.  Taking money from my 401k will let me pay off two small stupid debts (old credit card and Dell who is now charging me usury rates on a small sum of money and it is pissing me off), address a bigger debt, and catch up on my utilities.  It will resolve a lot of anxiety I have over general stuff in my life and help get my budgeting back on track.

Doing anything with money gives me clammy hands.  I hated my jobs where I handled money.  I’ve worked at a credit union and in payroll.  In my mind money is just numbers and it should be simple and straightforward, just like numbers.  But money also has emotion tied to it.  Money has greater meaning than just the sum.  Money is used to indicate success.  Money is used to open doors and create options.  I’ve always had a poor relationship with money and I know it is partially due to my fear of being honest about how I use it.  I’m not a squanderer, I’m just not a saver.

I know taking the 401k loan seems like more ‘anti-saving’ behavior from me, but I’m looking at it as taking money I have, putting it towards debts, and then paying myself back.  I’m not really creating another debt (even though technically I am).  Now part of this, the follow up to dealing with this part, will be the phone calls I need to make to get pay off amounts and get that sorted out.  Since the loan won’t be processed within two days, I won’t be able to count these calls as more fears conquered.  It will be the follow through though, to see if I am actually applying the lessons I’ve learned from this project.

Again, I’ve gotten some great feedback from readers, giving me a lot of positive encouragement.  It really is appreciated.  The fact you are reading the updates to this personal project is exciting to me.  I may be a misanthropic recluse hermit philosopher, but I do enjoy an audience.  Seeing that people are reading has made me hope that it isn’t just the diary aspect that keeps people reading but hopefully there is some element of this that makes the reader consider the fears in his or her life that may actually be obstacles to achieving valued goals.

To dare is to lose one’s footing momentarily. To not dare is to lose oneself. – Soren Kierkegaard

Day Seven – Music and Mayhem

As I relate these tales, I feel foolish.  I feel foolish becoming excited over the smallest things.  I feel foolish looking at the rewards I gained for the risks I’ve taken and realizing this is what everyone has been talking about all these years.

I’ve become accustomed to going to restaurants and movies by myself.  My friends are far flung, busy, or not interested in the same things as I am, so arranging minor get togethers is difficult.  I am able to do these things because I go to the same places over and over.  Familiarity is comfort to me.  Mind you, I also go during off hours.  I don’t want to be the guy sitting alone at a table.  I also tend to go to pubs where I can sit at the bar.  It feels less conspicuous sitting at the bar.  So when I walk into one of my preferred establishments and the bar is filled, I turn around and leave.

On Sunday nights one of my favorite places, The Grafton, has live Irish music.  I do love Celtic music of all sorts.  I’ve known about this since I moved into the neighborhood four years ago and have never bothered going because it tends to be crowded.  I had no proper excuse not to go this time.  I walked in, found a place at the bar, ordered up a Magners and did some reading and writing (which is my normal modus operandi when I go out).  The musicians filed in and began playing and it was sublime.  During the second hour a small older gentleman came in, sat down a stool away from me and ordered a Guinness while he listened to the music.  Suddenly he spilled his drink.  A great wave of Guinness came rushing down the bar.  Luckily my notebook and cellphone were out of the way but he felt awful.  I launched into a story about a recent date I had where I flung a glass of red wine on my date and that accidents like this happened.  This spurred the bartender to relate a story about how she did a similar thing to the owner of the bar.  We had a good laugh together and he insisted on buying me a drink.

We chatted a bit and I discovered he is an artist, from France, living in Chicago for the past fifteen years.  Additionally he loves Irish music and Guinness.  Truly a fascinating man.

The lesson in this happens to be really simple and one I already knew but obviously need to have it hammered home in my head over and over.  If I want to have interesting stories to tell, if I want to meet interesting people, I need to be out and about among them.  Consider the horrifying date I had where I splashed the wine on her.  I was mortified.  What good could possibly come from that event?  Yet, when this moment happened, I was able to use it to diffuse someone else’s embarrasment and open up a conversation where another shared a similar story.  It almost felt like kismet.  No, don’t worry, I’m not going to go all mystical in regards to this, I just couldn’t help but to see this chain of events so clearly.  The more interactions I have, the more interesting things happen, the more interesting things happen, the more options for initiating conversations I have, and the more conversations I have the more people I meet.  A snowball cycle is created.  The problem is when setbacks occur.  The more interactions I have the greater the chance of something dire truly happening which would create a negative cycle.  That is just my imagination getting the better of me.  I seem to want to know about every obstacle before I get to it, solve everyone problem before it arises.  If I may paraphrase a cliched quote, life is more about perspiration than preparation.  There is very little that can’t be resolved through pure effort.

Wait, what happened to Friday?  Did I totally wimp out and give up on this thing?  Let’s be realistic, it wouldn’t be the first time I stopped something midway because I found something else that interested me before.   Ohhh shiny!

No, no… let me break this down a bit.  Friday Chicago suffered crazy rainstorms and I faced the fear of driving through flood waters, but that is a normal standard good fear to have.  I decided, arbitrarily, that Friday was a ‘give me’ day because of the weather.  So the actual Day Six of this project was Saturday.

My friends put together a gathering for their daughter’s 8th grade graduation. Going to a friend’s house is not a huge deal for me but this wasn’t their house, it was a sibling’s house.  Also, this wasn’t the normal gathering of friends since this was a graduation party it was parents of a variety of kids.  I should put it out that fear of a gaggle (giggle?) of 8th grade girls is a perfectly normal natural fear.  A feral pack of predators, I tell you.

This event is exactly the sort of thing I would normally opt out of: lots of strangers and a long distance to drive.  The distance isn’t really a factor but my car is junk.  It seems anytime I drive somewhere of any distance, something goes wrong.  This was no exception.  My check engine light came on.  I know it isn’t the end of the world, but it reminds me that this vehicle needs to be serviced badly.  Was the day a success?  Partially.  I’m a wallflower.  Having conversations with people I don’t know is just so difficult, especially when they know each other.  Unless someone breaks out a conversation about perception based reality, state of nature, constitutional theory, or Star Trek, I sit dumbfounded.  Even the normal life stuff that people, people my age and younger, can talk about, like kids, homes, careers is beyond me.  I don’t know what married life is like.  I don’t know what owning a home is like.  I don’t know how difficult it is to negotiate the schedules of two kids.   Okay, that long whine is just part of my anxiety of having to face the reality that my life is following a distinct groove that makes me feel out of sync with everyone else and thus makes it more difficult to interact with other people.  What do I have to say that is of any interest to people?  My opinions on their topics of conversation are based purely on theory and conjecture, not actual life experience.  This does not bode well for my 20th high school reunion, but I will cross that rickety bridge when I arrive at it.

Apart from the drive and car issue, the critical points of my anxiety occur after arriving.  I suffer the social angst of wondering if I’ve arrived too early.  I like to be punctual, but in Chicago, no one is punctual.  I can’t tell you how many people have asked em to lie to them about start times of movies to make sure they get there in time.  I think people are so used to other people exaggerating when they have to be somewhere that they just add 30 minutes to any start time they hear.   Okay, okay, this isn’t supposed to be a pet peeve rant.  Also since I’ve never been to this house before, have only met my friend’s brother once before, I have severe trepidation of how to approach the house.  I hear the music coming from the backyard but I don’t know how to get there, and since I’m only going to know my friend, his wife and their kids, I don’t want to be some strange guy just appearing.

No lie, I sat in my car for twenty minutes formulating strategies.  Of course there is only one strategy – go up to the frakking door and ring the frakking bell.  Guess what? Well, you probably don’t have to guess, someone answered the door, someone I didn’t know and she asked if I was there for the party, I said yes, and she directed me to the backyard.  Simple as that. No third degree, no fingerprint scans, no judgment.

One interesting fact I did learn at this event: I am referred to as fake Uncle Sean.  “Who is that?” “Fake Uncle Sean.”  I started to take offense as I don’t think I’m fake, but it was meant to distinguish between their real Uncle and the guy who isn’t an Uncle but might as well be.

“The greatest barrier to success is the fear of failure.” – Sven Goran Eriksson

Here I am, just beyond the midpoint of my personal social experiment, and I’ve hit my first real obstacle. The nothingness. Not the nothingness that comes with nihilism but the nothingness that comes with literally no fear based obstacles in my path today. Sadly, this does mean a penalty dinner for me tonight as a reminder that a life led without taking risk is a bland life indeed.

I shall take this day of respite as a good time to take stock in the lessons I’ve learned so far. Admittedly, four days of messing about in the experimental pool doesn’t really qualify me to draw any hard and fast conclusions, but I can hopefully begin to sketch a few things out. I also know that I need to test my meddle in the real crucible – out and about among people. Can I approach the pretty woman and actually engage in a conversation or will the shadowy tendrils of fear that lurk in my brain prevent me?

I received a very nice note from a friend from high school pointing out that in this process perhaps I am applying the word fear in places where it doesn’t necessarily apply. It is okay not to like to talk on the phone. It is okay to have introverted preferences. I am not fooling myself into thinking that doing any of this will turn me from being introverted into an extrovert. I will still be drained by being around people, but hopefully I can start to find a benefit from being around people.

I know that I can introduce myself to people with no ill effect. I know that I can ask people for assistance relating to things I want and they will help. I’m still leery on the whole phone thing. That may go down as one of my ‘preferences’ that won’t get changed much.

Part of what I thought I would get from this experience is some real insight and strategies.  Sadly, I think there is only one true strategy for dealing with things that cause me anxiety and fear.  Run at them at full speed while screaming my bloody head off Braveheart style.  Hell, if I’m going to suffer angst dealing with people and events, then people around me might as well be startled and freaked out.

No?  Bad idea?  Okay, I’m not speaking literally here.  Once I’ve realized that I want to do something, have sufficiently analyzed consequences, then I need to just do it before my imagination kicks in and I start coming up with extreme crazy wild scenarios that only occur in weird British farces.

I see a few obstacles ahead of me.  Saturday I will be attending a friend’s daughter’s graduation party.  This is a party at someone’s house I’ve never been to and I won’t know many people there.  This is usually the formula that makes me run away.  I’ve got a ton of reasons not to go to events like this.  But… I really like these friends and I really want to help celebrate this auspicious event.

On Saturday night I’m going to go back out to Neo, a place I feel comfortable just sitting back, drinking and dancing, and actually force myself to approach people.  I’m not going to set a quota or do something like that as that adds a weird competitive pressure to it, and I despise that sort of pressure.  I’m anti-competitive.  Sort of.  Unless I know I’m good at something then I am kind of competitive.  I’ll deal with my hypocrisy some other time.

Day Four: Slaying the Phone Dragon

Death is not the biggest fear we have; our biggest fear is taking the risk to be alive — the risk to be alive and express what we really are. – Don Miguel Ruiz

The phone rings.  The phone rings again.  The phone rings yet again.  If it rings once more, obviously I’m not home.  Or I’m staring at the phone aghast, afraid of what could be on the other end.  There was a time when I didn’t have caller id and that was truly terrifying.  Each phone call is a situation where I am walking in blind.  I have no idea what is going to be expected of me.  This aspect of my fears has led me to be a receptionist at an insurance company and a help desk telephone support person.  Yes,  every day at work is filled with anxiety, but I face this fear consistently.  What I don’t do is the other side of the equation… I don’t make phone calls.

Seriously, ask my family, I just don’t call.  I do have some non-fear based reasoning behind this.  I do think telephones are very rude devices.  They are devices used to force someone to talk to you right now, no matter what you are actually doing.  I’m not fooling myself.  I know I’m rationalizing my fear.  So many of my daily, weekly, monthly problems could be solved by making a phone call.  So many of my relationships would be closer and more satisfying if I would use the phone.  I’m definitely the sort of person who has been able to function in the modern world because of electronic communication.  I can’t imagine living an adult life without being able to reach out to others through instant messaging, text messages, and email.

Today I did something that I’ve been meaning to do for nearly four months.  I called Comcast to downgrade my service.  My gut really wants to go off on an anti-Comcast rant here, but I don’t want to diminish the focus on a very real fear for me.  And despite this one ‘victory’… wait, I’m getting ahead of myself.

As soon as I got to work today I got my Comcast account number and the Comcast phone number and put them with my stuff so I’d have no excuse not to call at lunch.  An hour before lunch, I started coming up with all sorts of reasons why I should maybe do this tomorrow.  Or Friday.  I work half days on Friday in the summers so I could call then and wouldn’t have the time limit of only an hour.  No.  I had to do it today.  Shutting down my mind, my imagination, is key.  I needed to just do it, don’t think about it, just dial and do it.

I did it.  I called and spoke to a rep who in a few minutes reduced my bill by $40 for six months.  Truly a moment to celebrate.  Yet, I know this is a somewhat hollow victory because as I looked at other phone calls that I should make I got knots in my stomach.  Some things are just insurmountable to me right now.  I have to think of these things in terms of ‘ramping up’ to face them.  In the world of videogames you don’t fight the boss of the level right off the bat, you fight other smaller things first.

Yesterday I mentioned building a catalog of fear, a listing of all the things that I’m afraid of and then a detailing of why I cannot be afraid of them.  Today I’m adding to this a Fear List (am I overusing the word fear?) which I will write down all the things I’m not doing because of anxiety (ohh, anxiety, not fear, how different), rate it on a scale of  ‘I can do this’ to ‘Even with a gun to my head I won’t do this’ just so I can size things up better.  So, that phone call I really should make to the lawyers in charge of the lawsuit against me… yeah that is going to wait.  We’ll continue to communicate through mail, even though that is painfully slow and really isn’t bringing anything to a conclusion.  In the back of my mind, I’m thinking that I just won’t ever be in this situation ever again, but the reality is at any point in time, as an adult, I will be expected to act like an adult and have very non-fun adult conversations with very serious people.

I declared today a success because I did point out an obstacle in my life that my fear was preventing me from removing and I overcame it.  I am not going wild in celebration because I know that this is one of my ‘big fears’ and it will take a lot more than a few successful phone calls to make me feel like I  have successfully countered it.