Doubt

Doubt is a powerful thing. I doubt myself all the time, usually in matters that aren't important, but they still take up a lot of my time. For instance, when I'm in a meeting, I quite often start to daydream. My mind drifts and I think of everything except the reason we've been assembled. When I'm shaken from my daze, usually by someone asking what I think about the subject matter, I give some vague answer. The thing is, because I'm disengaged I think that I'll have a wrong or misinformed answer. I doubt myself, but most of the time I enter the meeting with a pre-determined set of actions and alternatives because the meeting is not necessary. Rarely do I respond with the pre-determined actions, I always give the vague, bullshit answer. Why? Because I think that the people who have spent a lot of time discussing and hashing out things have a better handle on them than I do. 99.9% of the time, I'm wrong about that. I could have come into the meeting with the solution. I let doubt take over because really that's my comfort zone.

I'm asked to speak at a dizzying number of places in Satan's Anus and I reluctantly accept. I used to hem and haw my way through the speech, hoping to reach the end and mercifully sit down or leave. The one thing I never counted on until recently is the doubt in the majority of the audience. Give me a mike and some notes, and all of a sudden I become the expert. You might have a different opinion or a different set of facts, but I got the mike bitch! Subverting my self-doubt and replacing it with arrogance and an embrace of the inherent power of standing before a crowd and imposing your own knowledge has been a revelation.

I leave my doubt for my personal life. I've abandoned it as a profession. It took me long enough, but I'm there.

Peace,
KZ