Sweat starts building up on my forehead, my hands start shaking as I stand in the wings overlooking the silhouette of an audience in a pitch, black auditorium.
“And now presenting, Cristina Marie!”, the MC says.
I get a nudge, “Go, that’s you!”.
The room grows silent and the stage seems to get longer with every step that I take.
I finally arrive at my mark, a blinding spotlight shines on my face.
I tap the microphone, “testing, testing 1 2 3” – a loud squeal of feedback rings throughout the room.
I clear my throat, step up to the microphone, and introduce myself to the world.…
“Hello, my name is Cristina Marie”.
Now, one day I hope to actually be introducing myself to a crowded auditorium, but until then, my auditorium is this blog, and you, my fellow reader, are the audience.
What is this blog going to be about, you ask?
Well, that is a more complicated answer.
Let me back up –
When the Fear of Regret Outweighs the Fear of Failure
When your dream is so vivid – when it’s all you can think about, or dream about, or see, taste, hear – how can you possibly not pursue it with everything you have inside? The regret of not trying weighs so much heavier than any sort of small judgment, criticism, or even failure along the way.
I’ve been writing since I was a little girl. Writing was something that allowed me to immortalize the stories I would make up in my head. I had journals and diaries and stacks of random pieces of paper that I would collect full of sentences strung together to describe the world of my imagination.
As I’ve gotten older, writing has become more of a tool.
When going through some of the hardest times in my life, writing was an outlet for me to scream or cry or simply be, in silence. I could make sense of things or simply describe it and then read it to myself in order to take in a situation in third person. As I went through different hurdles, I would write down what I learned or record my research so that I could grow from it and ensure something like it never happened again. It became therapeutic- I created a listener for myself.
When going through some of the happiest times in my life, writing has been my way to capture my feelings as if holding them in a lockbox to open and feel whenever I want. I love describing every single detail – my surroundings, my emotions, the people I am with, the smells, the tastes – all described with color and sensitivity so I can relive the moment again and again.
When I turned 30, I had a big voice inside tell me that I need to begin writing and releasing it into the world. The images of me writing books or speaking on podcasts or being invited to speak at events flooded my mind and filled me with excitement – it felt like everything inside me lit up, like I had found my purpose – it all felt so real.
But then fear flooded in.
Having always been a very private person, the thought of putting anything out into the world seemed scary – Who’s going to care what I have to say? What if people judge me? What if they tear me down? What if no one reads it? Am I even cut out for this? Do I have what it takes? Am I too late in life to start something like this?
I tried shutting the fear out and pursuing the dream of building a space for me to write. On and off for the past year and a half, I’ve been chipping at what this dream is. I’ve gone months not believing in it, but, like clockwork, the little voice inside – each time a little louder – makes me pick up my pen and continue writing.
I seem to get closer to hitting publish or to putting something out into the world, and then I chicken out. I draw back, I change my mind, and I add yet another article to my over-flooded folders in Notion.
It was January 9, 2025. I was writing yet another article that started out with a lot of excitement and belief in it, and then slowly was taken over by fear and placed in another folder. As I stood up to take a break, I got this big heavy feeling in my chest. A voice inside, almost screaming at this point, saying “Don’t look back at this time with regret of not trying – time is only going to continue moving forward”.
All of a sudden, my heart started racing, sweat began building up on my forehead.
What am I doing? Why am I wasting this time? I have so much I want to say to the world. Who cares about a little criticism, a little judgement?
I love writing, it’s what I want to do – I may not know where this is going to take me, or what’s going to come of it, but I know that my desire to connect with people, to share with people, to inspire people and be inspired by people is so much bigger than anything else in life.
It’s the only path I see myself in – it’s my calling and I’m not going to continue ignoring it.
The fear of regret all of a sudden got so much bigger than any fear of failure, or judgment.
Like the dream I talked about at the beginning – the one that you just can’t seem to shake off, the one that creeps up in such a vivid and colorful way, so real you can feel it and taste it – for me, that unshakeable dream is me being a writer.
So, here I am, bearing my all and committing full force. Writing is my passion. Storytelling, painting pictures with words, gaining and sharing perspectives – that is my passion, and I am going to release any fear and put all of my trust in my journey.
I want to write about life, share my thoughts and ideas, I want to talk about the human experience and about the simple pleasures in life. I want to share advice I’ve learned along the way, tips on things I have spent time digging into, and just simply share in things I love to learn about – music, books, being outside, wellness, quality of life, food, and really anything else that pops out to me in life.
I’m excited to simply begin this journey – not give myself too many rules, just give myself the freedom and the space to write whatever comes to my mind, whatever feels right in that moment, and hopefully meet some like- minded people to share it with along the way.
I am fascinated by this beautiful world we all live in and I wish to share this fascination with anyone who will listen.
So, thank you for being here – thank you for reading – and I am excited to see what this new adventure will bring 🙂
Until next time,
Cristina Marie <3
