If I could go back and be a kid, again, there’s one thing that I would change. I’d look at my fears and try to expand my comfort zone beyond my own narrow, limited beliefs. Literally and figuratively, I would take more swings and learn to hit the ball better as a result.
Yeah. If I could go back in time, I would come to the plate, stop swinging for the fences and try to hit more singles.
As an adult, I know (intellectually) that every obstacle, every missed, swing, is an opportunity to learn to be a better, competent player. As a kid, though, I usually ran away when someone threw a fastball (we didn’t have curveballs in little league). As a result, I went through my first 40 years scared to come up to bat.
This may surprise some of you who see me as a competent risk taker, a fellow who ditched the status quo, found a gal who believed in the same crazy dreams and pursued work and personal goals with a mix of creativity, gusto and guts.
This is all true… to a point.
I have made a nice life zigging left instead of right, carving a path that allowed Beth and I to combine the American dream with an artistic one. Of this accomplishment, I am very grateful, happy and proud, yessiree.
My Achilles Heal, though, the Greek-like flaw that has plagued me and kept me from greatness, is my unwillingness to really and truly suck. I’m lousy as hell when it comes to potential rejection, embarrassment or not being admired. As a performer who is accustomed to applause, I avoid being cast in a flop. Like in my youth, I simply shudder at the thought of swinging at a ball and missing.
This is understandable, but limiting, because:
A great hitter, one who hits .300, will miss 7 out of 10 times!
A hit album will have 1, maybe 2, hit singles out of 15 songs!
And a great painter, architect or stockbroker will paint, design or invest in crappy stuff multiple times during a successful career. Such is life.
I’m not a complete stranger to this kind of sucking. Beth and I wrote a bunch of musical clunkers on the way to composing songs that are beautiful, humorous or effective. Evidently, I’m not afraid to fall on my ass as a songwriter…but I prefer to do so in private!
So, I guess it’s public humiliation that I fear.
Like most boys, I have long feared striking out in the bottom of the 9th inning with two outs to lose the game. In my boyhood world view, this “tragedy” was/is the worst fate that can befall a baseball player.
This leads me to conclude that my current trauma about sucking is a vestige of childhood, a leftover fear that my team, the opposing team and all of the assembled parents will laugh like hell when I strike out at the plate. Instead of being the hero, I’ll be the fool.
Phew! It’s scary to even type this. It’s embarrassing to admit that I can be a quivering bundle of mush at times. I would rather you see me as Super Scott, a strong, confident warrior capable of great things!
As Bruce Springsteen once said, I wish I always felt like the Boss that everyone thought I was.
My friend, Jeff Coplan, a music producer told me that he has never met an artist of any stature that does not suffer from insecurity. This is how humans are made.
Sigh. So, I’ll post this and let it go. I’ll embrace the suck and try to do so more often.
As Bruce Hornsby sang, “That’s just the way it is. Some things will never change. That’s just the way it is.”
