Fear Sure Can Be Blinding

Greetings and Salutations,
      Brrr.. its cold around here. These are the times, along with many others, I wish I had a fireplace. Maybe my new apartment will have one (its high on the wish list). So lets get down to business of what's going on in my life and brain.
      So the move to San Francisco/Bay Area is on and in full swing. I sometimes feel as if I am in a fog or dream-like state. Sometimes I am blinded by excitement, other times crippled by unadulterated fear when I think about moving to San Francisco. On one hand I am scared to death to pick up and move. I fear I am sailing into financial ruin. I have chosen to move without having a job. The medical field is much different then when I was out there last. Manager's are able to cherry-pick their staff. As with anyone else in today's world cut backs, sending nurses home early, and lots of people vying for the same job make me very very nervous. I have been away from the bedside for five years. I would like to think I have a chance of landing a job that I actually like and not just "grabbing something". For five years I've been more on the end of just trying to get through the day vs truly liking my work. For the past nine months I've been grieving. I am more that ready for sunlight in my life.
     I am walking away from friends that I have worked hard to cultivate. I am walking away from a city I truly love that suffocates me concurrently. I am walking away from a job that paid the bills. I am walking away from the life I have made here. I am moving from a place where I feel like a big fish in a little pond to place where I may feel like a small fish in a big pond. There have been several points along the way thus far where I have been so scared I thought I'd pass out or puke for sure. Stuck in a point of knowing I can't and don't want to turn around and go back but being completely unable to put one foot in front of the other for fear the ground underneath me had evaporated.
     Part of me feels like I am leaving mom even though I know she isn't here. She so loved Charleston. I won't see her house anymore. I won't see her garden anymore. I won't see or touch the things that my step dad Fred has in the house they shared. Things that are just mom. The thought of this makes me cry. It is a large portion of what scares me underneath. What if I forget something about her? What if I don't even know what it is until I see it in the house when I go over to visit with Fred? What if it is just knowing I can go over to the house even if I rarely do? What if I never see some of the people that have been important to me again? These are the things that my fears are made of. This is what Fear whispers to me in the quite of the night and the recesses of my mind.
     I fear, however much of a tiny sliver of a chance that would be, that I will be all "hell yes" until I get out there and then chicken out just about the time I accept a job and sign a year lease on an apartment and wanna move back. What if I fail myself? I feel I can't and really don't want to come back to Charleston, yet South Carolina is the only home I've ever known. For the first time in my life I have to make a home without my mom. Its also difficult to imagine home in a place that's never really been......home.
     Now what about the excitement? I can just about pee my pants thinking about a place that I feel like I belong. I love the shear beauty of the West Coast in general. California is a beautiful state. San Francisco is my love. Yeah, the people are alittle strange, but I get that about them. Maybe I feel like they get that about me. I get the diversity. I love that about Cali. I love even the perceived work opportunities I know I will have available to me. I truly feel with the money I can make out there, even with the cost of living, I can give myself the life I want and aspire to have.
     I am going out there next week for a vacay and can't wait. My intent was not to have a depressing blog and point out only my fears because that isn't where my mind spends the most time. I just wanted to be honest and transparent on what my fears are. I reside mainly in the possibilities and excitement of this move. I am just plainly out of blog time. I will be bubbling over when I come back from my trip and will have the next blog be about the "rest of the story" (in my best Paul Harvey voice).
     The exuberant, happy, and know I am making the right choice in my soul blog. I know this to be true. No matter the fear, even if it ends in failure, I am doing what my soul is leading me to do and that is most awesome. Pushing past your fears and stretching to reach what you deeply desire I have to say, already rocks beyond my expectations. I can't wait to see what is around the next corner and that is coming up very soon. I leave it up to fate and destiny. Bring it......

Tootles :)
Heather