February IWSG: New things are always the scariest...

Hello my lovelies! Welcome back to the Insecure Writer's Support Group - a monthly blog hop where writers across the internet get together to share their insecurities and encourage each other to keep going. The IWSG was set up by the fantastic Alex. J. Cavanaugh, and you can check out the official website/sign-up list here! I'm super excited to be co-hosting this month - every month I tell myself I'll visit more blogs, but I never seem to get round to it - but this month, I'm SO EXCITED to be visiting all you awesome people!

So, if I'm completely honest, my insecurities this month don't stem from my writing - BUT, if you're thinking of starting a new writing project, or even if you're just thinking about starting to write altogether, I think you'll know what I'm talking about. If you've been following my blog for a while, you'll know that the only writing I've been doing lately is when I've been working on my fantasy novel project - this is something that I'm writing just for me, with no intention of being published (yet). So there's no pressure to write, or to get it perfect first time, which is great.

However, over the past couple of weeks, I've been wondering about setting something else up - something that's (shock, horror), nothing to do with writing. It's actually to do with YouTube. Whenever I think about this particular project, I get super excited but equally...I'm terrified.

What if I'm a big failure? What if everyone hates what I do? What if I give up? What if I can't do it? What if the YouTube craze is 'over' and no one will care anymore? What if, what if, what if?

Are you noticing a pattern here?

But whenever these doubts creep in, I have to stop and reason with myself. How will I ever know if I'll be a success or a failure, if I don't even try? I've already failed.

So people might not watch my videos. So what? So I might get negative comments. So what? I'm a writer, I'm used to less-than-perfect reviews and I know how to handle them (i.e. don't take any notice of them).

Yes, it's super scary to put yourself out there - but you won't know what you're capable of until you at least try. And if you do fail? Does it really matter? All that means is that you're one step closer to finding the right method of writing, or career, or whatever it is you're searching for, for you.

I am so scared right now in case I fail. But equally, I will never know what could've been if I don't at least try.

I'm going to leave you with this quote that completely sums up how I've been feeling this week - it was completely incidental that I found it before writing this post, but I can't think of a more perfect quote to leave you all with:

What have you done lately that's scared you? How did you get over your fears? How's your writing going this month? What do you think of the new IWSG badge??