{"id":6067,"date":"2021-08-24T15:29:13","date_gmt":"2021-08-24T15:29:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/markdjacobsen.com\/?p=6067"},"modified":"2021-08-24T15:31:32","modified_gmt":"2021-08-24T15:31:32","slug":"why-you-should-tell","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/markdjacobsen.com\/2021\/08\/24\/why-you-should-tell\/","title":{"rendered":"Why You Should Tell Your Hardest Story"},"content":{"rendered":"

Later this week I am appearing on Mike Burke’s podcast “Always in Pursuit.” To accompany the podcast, I wrote this guest post for his blog. It is repeated here in its entirety, but be sure to check out Always in Pursuit<\/a> for much more on these themes.<\/i><\/p>\n

I’m going to venture a guess. Each day when you prepare for work, you strap on metaphorical armor. You’ve been at this a while and have developed a battle-hardened persona. You project confidence, ambition, and a relentless focus on success and mission accomplishment. You shrug off setbacks, roll with the punches, and laugh with your peers.<\/p>\n

But underneath beneath that armor lies something you would never dare reveal: a self sometimes haunted by uncertainty and self-doubt. You carry wounds: scars from old failures, a lingering sense of shame, the trauma of broken relationships or abuse or catastrophe, the restless fear that you don’t have what it takes. These feelings might dominate your daily inner life or just drop by occasionally like an unwelcome guest, but they’re never entirely absent.<\/p>\n

The details will vary, of course. We each walk our own journey. Some people seem immune to self-doubt. But we are all human, and for most people, that means we live with a shadow side that we fear revealing to the world.<\/p>\n

Joseph Campbell<\/a> taught us that every story is a variant on the same old myth: in our innocence we set out into a world that is strange and sometimes wonderful and often brutal. We face great peril, escape traps, and fight dragons, but our greatest battle is a confrontation with\u00a0ourselves<\/em>. At the heart of that journey lies what Campbell called “the innermost cave,” the place we most dread to go. It is the place we must finally enter if we are to ever grow into our truest, noblest selves. Think Luke Skywalker coming face to face with himself in Darth Vader’s mask in a vision on Dagobagh, or Frodo staring into the fires of Mt. Doom, facing his moment of ultimate temptation.<\/p>\n

I want to issue you a challenge: you need to go there. You need to enter your innermost cave and then come back to tell the story.<\/p>\n

My story<\/h2>\n

If that admonition evokes terror, I understand. Five years ago, I went through a scorching season of personal breakdown. I had walked away from a promising trajectory as an Air Force pilot to pursue a passionate dream that combined innovation and education. The nonprofit I founded crashed and burned after a year and a half of wholehearted, nonstop work. My PhD research agenda collapsed, and I found myself feeling alone, having lost the faith of nearly everyone whose support I needed. Health problems surfaced and my mental health frayed. I became badly burned out but couldn’t get out from under the weight of my responsibilities. It took me a couple years to find a way through the ensuing dark night of the soul.<\/p>\n

I eventually found my way into my innermost cave, where I began writing. I wrote dozens of pages of journal entries\u2014raw, honest, vulnerable reflections on aspects of failure and its aftermath. I wrote about emotions like fear, anger, and disappointment. As time went by and I found my feet again, I wrote about the halting, uncertain journey back to health and renewed strength. Somewhere in there, I realized I had enough material for a book. I turned these reflections into Eating Glass: The Inner Journey Through Failure and Renewal<\/a>. I thought the book could help others who were struggling in the aftermath of a failure experience.<\/p>\n

That was when the magnitude of my choice became apparent. Do I tell this story? Do I dare reveal my self-doubt and weakness to the world? How would I ever survive this? I felt visceral, white-knuckled, paralyzing fear.<\/p>\n

Which brings us back to you<\/em> and your<\/em> story.<\/p>\n

Why we fear vulnerability<\/h2>\n

Most of us are afraid to disclose our hardest life experiences. I believe we gain power over things by giving them names, so let’s inventory some of these fears. These fears are understandable but they are largely bullshit. As we go, let’s reframe each one properly.<\/p>\n