hold your nerve
Anxiety is the worst use of imagination.
Unfortunately, I am cursed with both anxiety AND a vivid imagination.
So, I live in a constant state of "Schrödinger's Disaster" where simultaneously something horrible could be happening OR everything could be totally fine.
Like right now, for example. I'm working on a particularly difficult copywriting project and I submitted the first draft for feedback on Friday. The first draft is quite rough and I asked for a LOT of feedback and clarification on the project because, to be honest, they kinda gave me simultaneously too much info to include and too little direction on what they actually want.
(And also, there's the huge factor that my MOM referred me to this job and so there's so much more pressure to be flawless.)
So, I did the best with what I have and I sent a first draft with a huge disclaimer saying like, "More direction is needed on this, please let me know what's working and what isn't, and we can go from there."
I haven't heard back from them yet. So, therefore, according to my anxiety they think I'm the most terrible, useless, unprofessional writer in the history of the world. They think hiring me was a huge, awful waste of time and money, and they are going to cancel the project and try to get a refund.
Thanks to my therapy last year, I know this is my anxious brain catastrophizing. That's a worst case scenario and in my 14 years of freelancing, I've only ever really had one or two clients who have acted in that way.
Even if they do act like that, that doesn't mean I'm an awful copywriter. In the past, when that's happened it's been a case of a Client From Hell who isn't able to communicate what they want.
After all, I really DO know what I'm doing and I AM good at my job. When I get the information and direction I need and I'm able to wrap my head around a project - 95% of the time I absolutely nail it and the client is thrilled.
So, this situation doesn't mean I've fucked up. It just means that I didn't get the information I needed to nail the project on the first try, and that I need more guidance. And really, if they aren't able to provide feedback/additional information after I ask for it - then THEY are the unprofessional ones, not me.
Logically, I understand this. But, tell that to the aching pit in my stomach that lurches every time I get an inbox notification.
My approach has been just to hold my nerve and wait for an email reply from them, and try not to think about it too much. But of course, it's almost impossible to STOP thinking about it, as my anxious brain LOVES a potent, sticky worry like this one.
I'm starting to realise that my anxious brain just really WANTS me to feel like shit, you know?
It doesn't really matter WHAT it's obsessing about. If it wasn't this, it would be something else. Health worries, career worries, relationship worries... will something awful happen to my husband, my dog, my friends?
A few weeks ago, the big sticky worry was renewing my passport. "What if something goes wrong and they don't grant the renewal, and I can't go on our trip in April? What if it gets lost in the mail? What if, for some reason, they decide I've lived abroad for too long and I don't have the right to be Canadian anymore?"
Yeah, that doesn't even make sense. But it doesn't matter.
My anxious mind just LOVES to be scared and panicked.
It doesn't actually matter how calm and fine everything is - my brain will just invent something to worry about. And BOY is it creative. I've worried about some pretty imaginative things - tying myself in knots with panic about stuff that never actually happened and was never GONNA happen.
I see my anxiety as a wannabe horror writer who lives in my brain. (I actually wrote a poem about this a while ago, maybe I'll share it here.)
This creepy Stephen-King-wannabe in my brain is obsessed with writing stories that genuinely terrify me. She bursts in unannounced to read me her newest draft, whether I want to hear it or not.
Her stories are so compelling. They are always somewhat rooted in truth and therefore entirely possible. No aliens or dinosaurs or fantasy creatures - they are always about things that COULD potentially happen - which makes them all the more nerve-wracking.
And the problem is, she's REALLY GOOD. She knows exactly what scares me the most, she knows what I love and what I'm afraid to lose. She's a real master of the genre.
So, when I find myself getting that tell-tale tightening in my chest as one of her horror films starts streaming in my subconcious, I'll say out loud, "WOW, good one. You really got me there. That's some high quality horror. Truly fucking scary. Nice work."
It's really helped quite a bit.
But yeah, I'd love to figure out how to harness that imaginative power and turn it into, I dunno... something that DOESN'T leave me desperately trying to hold my nerve in the face of debilitating panic.
But you know, I'll get there.