What do you fear most?

Today in the TED Radio Hour the question of fear came up.

What do we fear? Growing up, my fear was always not getting a degree. Was I ever going to find the right career? Then the fear of getting too old and not accomplishing things in life, and now?

The fear of being alone is what I fear the most. My mother has always told me she never fears about me not ever finding a job. She has told me, she can tell when my wheels are turning and when I want to do something, I just go right on ahead and do it. I guess you can say I have been fearless when it comes to life decisions concerning my career, where to move and what needs to be done. But deep down, the fear of having much success and not having someone to share it with, that is the fear I have.

Lately, I have felt like I finally fit in. I have been in Midland for almost a year and even though I find myself having a weekly routine of going to where I am comfortable, I fear loneliness. Throughout my life, moving somewhere and getting a job, the job part was always a comfortable fit. It was a new challenge, something exciting. Give me the task at hand and I will do it. But finish work, head on home and have no one to talk to? Yeah, that was the fear. The worse were the weekends, still are. And 3-day weekends like this one that's coming up, there's fear. I have no one to hang with, talk to and do things with.

In Bay City, I would literally go a weekend without talking to someone. That was the scariest thing for me to do, fearing loneliness and having an anxiety attack over it, drove me to actually get in my car and drive away. I would head over to Sugar Land, go to the movies, sit at a Starbucks for hours at a time, all to have the sense that I had a human being around me.

But why would I do this to myself? I was determined to work the job, I cared so much about my career, I wanted to grow and become someone in my field.

I find myself doing this here. But as much as I do feel alone, I feel I can settle here. For the first time in a really long time, I can honestly say I can live here for the rest of my life.

I am sitting in my dinning room table now, just finished dinner and now listening to music. If I had someone here with me, I would be talking about my work day, instead of writing off into the void.

Let's see what this 3-day weekend will bring forth.