A patient of mine,
alias A.O., has high standard for herself and astonishing grades in school. The
excellence is built on a lot of hard work and long hour studying, something she
decides to do and has full control. She has a spell. She gets very nervous on
stage or in a presentation. The level of nervousness can skyrocket into an
episode of a panic attack. Over the years, she developed some ways to manage
the anxiety. Focusing on breathing, visualizing happy or relaxing environments,
being positive, convincing herself that she has put in so much effort and known
everything inside out and nothing will go wrong…, all the prescriptions from
the professionals.
Actually, there is
an unconventional suggestion, given by her nerdy classmate, and she finds
helpful sometimes.
A.O. still
remembers vividly the “wisdom” she received in high school when she was
extremely nervous about doing a presentation. Her classmate turned over and
said firmly with a Russian accent "If you know you're going to
suck, why bother worrying about it. Just go out there and suck".
She couldn’t bear all the negative
words at the beginning. After digesting the words, she found that it helped.
Ah ha, what’s wrong if we suck?
Shall we be ashamed when we suck?
Why do we have to rock to have
fun? Can we not have fun when we suck?
It’s not the end of my life; it’s
certainly not the end of the world!
On the other hand, by saying “we
rock” doesn’t make us rock.
Don’t get me wrong that I embrace
failure. Failure or success, I embrace the work, the process, something I
control and decide, and accept the outcome. Life is not only about achieving,
gaining or succeeding.
