I’m sitting in the quiet darkness of my room at Seattle University, my roommate sleeping peacefully next to me while our fan gently sends cool air across my flushed skin.

I’m coming off of an adrenaline rush from earlier in the evening- one fueled by sheer panic, paralyzing fear and a crazy, chaotic feeling of courage. The fact that I’m creating something that I care deeply about and revealing it to the rest of the world in only a few days stirred something deep inside my soul tonight. I'm cross-legged on my bed and beginning to hyperventilate as tears stream down my cheeks. For the first time in almost two months, my tears aren't from grief – they're from the beautifully overwhelming feeling of passionate daring. 

I have felt this flame before. As I sit here, I'm struggling to pinpoint this feeling – why does this feel so familiar? There is something deeper tugging at me than simply the fear of failure and I try to remember when I have felt this kind of impassioned agitation before.

All of a sudden, it hits me.

I felt it at twelve years old when I told my best friends that I would be going to a different middle school than them. I felt it at fourteen as I learned what it meant to be in a relationship with someone – then again as I tried to figure out how to get out of one. I felt it at fifteen when I played golf on the high school team, shooting four over par every time and placing dead last on the team roster. I felt it at sixteen as I pulled myself up and out of an achingly deep sadness. I could feel at it eighteen when I moved into college and had to to live on my own, feeling like a stranger in my own city. Flash forward to the present - I’m almost nineteen with my face buried in my hands, cross-legged on my bed, mere moments away from revealing this deeply personal project. As I sort through all of these painful memories, I become acutely aware of the thread that ties them together. 

These tears are rooted in transformation. 

Transformation: a part of me is changing and being replaced with something new. My worldview is expanding. Ambivalence is not a possibility anymore – my heart is being thrust into a new day-to-day existence, where I inevitably invite new energy into who I am and everything that makes me unique. It is both a celebration and a funeral; it is the birth of new joy, unfamiliar growth, and transformative change.

It is also the death of an old identity. 

Have you ever been doing something so bold and so new that you feel both deep panic and profound exhilaration? Travelling on your own to a new part of the world, handing in your two-week’s notice, choosing to go to college, choosing to not go to college, holding yourself accountable, holding someone else accountable, putting boundaries down and enforcing them, saying goodbye to someone you loved deeply – all of these are examples of situations where anxiety & nervous intensity can influence our sense of stability.

When we feel vulnerability and panic rising, threatening to overwhelm the flutter of adventure on our fingertips, it is crucial that we maximize the opportunity to sit within that feeling and understand it deeply.

Seriously, sit in it. Let the tears stream down your cheeks. Don’t be afraid to hold your breath and submerge yourself in the weight of this soul transformation - because in that moment, you are truly entering a process of renewal. You are scared and panicked because new energy is flooding your consciousness and your sense of who you are.

Let the change happen – instead of fighting the fear, let it fuel you. 

I am familiar with what transformation feels like and I understand that it can be hard, painful, and uncomfortable. However, I also understand that it can be incredibly beautiful. It means shaking off the dust and stepping into the sunlight. Tears stain my cheeks because I am intensely aware that I am about to step into a new way of being. Try for a moment to set aside how terrifying that is.

Isn’t that absolutely incredible? That humans have the ability to encounter new projects, relationships, hobbies, or experiences and become a revitalized and extraordinary version of themselves?

I am walking right into a new flame of being. This project is terrifyingly vulnerable and I am scared to death of failure. But what is there to fail at? I am trying something so new and so scary that I am being forced to draw from the deepest source of courage possible, and it feels incredible.

I can feel strength radiating from my center each day – by stepping into this new, courageous space of transformation, I am simultaneously stepping into a space where I trust myself. I trust my courage. I am not afraid to change. Humans are built to change, to evolve, to become enlightened and respond accordingly. So, try to embrace the new, the terrifying, the scary, and the vulnerable because it will transform you, and this transformation will bathe you in new, exhilarating energy. It will expand the way you view the world in all of its radiant potential.

Trust the fear.

It means something great is about to happen.