Risk

Has it ever happened that you've been listening to or singing along with a song that you are familiar with (and in my case, don't even like that much!) and all of a sudden you hear something you never heard before?

That happened last night to me with a song by John Lamberton Bell...there is a line in one of his songs that goes "Will you risk the hostile stares/Should your life attract or scare" and it just hit a nerve. I have such ambivalent feelings about risk...in one sense there is the craving for the new and unexperienced but there is an equally strong fear about unexpected outcomes, rejection, and possible disappointment. Some might chalk it all up to confidence but it is easy to be confident in activities that we routinely do. That is why repetition can at times be so comforting.

But this line highlights the risk of being in the spotlight which, to me, sometimes feels like being under a microscope. The hazards of being an introvert in a creative field. Unless your only audience is the mirror, you need to put yourself and your work out there and once you release it to the world, it is out of your hands. I think it takes a detachment that I have yet to acquire.