The Number One Reason Why You Should Challenge Yourself
Follow Your Fear
When I hear people say: ‘In my life, I love challenges’, I feel bad, like someone who is easily satisfied with anything the world offers. After all, I don’t need too much money to survive, I am not so ambitious, or competitive. I like my regular life. Yet, if I think about it, I can recall a time when I challenged myself. It was when I decided to go to Panama on my own.
Is there a place in your imagination that makes you think: one day I want to go there? What will my feelings be once I am there? Will it be better than I expect?
To me that secret place was the Panama Canal. It is on the other side of the world for a person living in Italy. At that time, they used to say Panama was a dangerous country, not a place for a young girl travelling alone. Here came the big challenge, I had to go.
On the day of the departure I was so anxious that I dressed up like a person who is going to a special event, and when the plane landed in Panama the customs agents stopped me for a body check: maybe they thought I was dangerously concealing some expensive content in my carry on. I was afraid of them, and they were afraid of me.
Then I started looking for a hotel, and I remember that I booked a room in cheap one, went to my room, realized that the door could be easily opened from the outside even if I put a chair against it, which I did, so I took my bag, went downstairs, and said I had to leave.
To feel safer, I had to book a room in an expensive hotel. The city was full of tourists, so it didn’t really seem so dangerous, but being a young woman alone I felt uncomfortable. There I realized I am always afraid of something, and now I know this is a part of my personality that I don’t like and that I am trying to change.
One day I took a bus to reach the canal. I expected to go on a bus full of dogs or chickens, and with people sitting on the top floor, but it was not like that. It was an ordinary bus, like those you see every day in Italy. So I realized I had prejudices, and I needed to work on them. I finally visited the canal, and the museum, I took pictures, I did it all. After a few days I left Panama and got back home.
It was like saying to myself: hey, you made it!
If I think about it, I don’t know how I could even think of going there alone, and I can’t imagine my mother’s reaction: I am sure she spent her nights awake while waiting for my return.
The aim of that journey was not just to visit the canal and come back. It was fighting my fear of loneliness and unknown people. I didn’t realize it at that time, but it was a journey within myself, it was meant as a challenge and it worked. The more I think of it, the prouder I am. I showed myself that I can face my deepest fears, that even if I love my regular life, I can create and accept a challenge, when it comes.
Facing your personal challenge will surprise you because you will find out that you are stronger that you think. It will remove all other little emotions that block you, it will allow you to face your daily challenges or little fears because they will look smaller and easier. It will make you consider other behaviors you never thought of before. You will act more and think less about your actions, you will feel that you are growing as a human being.
It will also show new aspects of you to other people. You will become more interesting, you will have a new energy in your body, and hopefully you will inspire other people to face their fears.