When I have fears that I may fail
That I may not be good or great
That I may disappoint myself
That I may not be good enough
When I have fears that I may not be a good enough
That I may fail my baby even before she is born
That I may give her my bad genes
That I may set her to doom before greatness
When I have fears that I may die
That I may sleep and not wake up
That I may crash my car and everyone with me
That I may inhale and never exhale
When I have fears that I may give up
That I may quit on people who need me
That I may walk away from that which truly scares me
That I may never drive, be a mom or take a risk
In class today, I was urged to write about my fears. I genuinely struggle with fear. I always feel I can take on things that scare me. I decided to open my heart or as Abhay would say, “Put your heart it in it, Tolu”. I wrote about my three biggest fears.
Firstly, I wrote about my overbearing fear of failure. I remember the first time I failed a test. I did not know how to react. I didn’t know what to think. I had no idea what to do. I felt hollowed out by failure. As though failure had scooped my insides out and left me with the emptiness of being a failure. I felt inadequate, and that’s just one of the times my fear of failure crippled me. I seem to forget that making mistakes is inevitable and my beauty is in my imperfection.
Secondly, I wrote about my fear of having children. Actually, my fear of being a mother. I’m not scared of being pregnant, giving birth or even physically taking care of my children. I’m scared of being a mom. I’m scared of being someone’s everything. I’m scared of the huge responsibility of molding someone’s entire life. I’m scared of failing at that. I’m scared that I may make a mistake and set generations to come on a path of destruction.
Thirdly, I’m scared of driving. It may seem minuscule on the grand scheme of things. I think this fear began in my grade 9 health class. I was passionate about driving before then. I remember these videos we had to watch about drunk driving, reckless driving and distracted driving.The images of people flying out of windows, the videos of mothers crying at funerals, all those things make me want to sit in a passenger seat of someone’s car and never trade places.
Lastly, I’m scared of dying. This seems like a generic fear but I’m actually very scared of not being alive on earth anymore. I don’t know why, or how to tackle it, but I am scared. Very scared.
November 6, 2019 at 9:02 pm
Dear Tolu,
First of all, I’m glad to notice how you made an incredible piece out of a small breadcrumb we discussed in class. The idea of writing about your fears was a great one, and your writing really captured that emotion and fright very strongly. I know it’s difficult to write about what you’re afraid of; as the constant thought and physical expression of it can make it into a reality, but we all have our insecurities and fears and part of life is just coping with them.
I absolutely loved the short poetic stanzas with each stanza focusing on one particular fear. The poems were well written and seemed relevant, and it was easy to tell what you feared although it wasn’t so direct as to compromise the poetic beauty you weave throughout your writing.
My only feedback for this piece would be for you to increase the length; as I feel like expanding upon these three fears with maybe just four or five more lines to each stanza would help me enjoy your writing even more that I already do. In short, Tolu, I loved this piece and I wish there was a little more of it.
Once again, excellent job. Your ideas and themes were wonderful in this post and I look forward to reading your work again.
Yours in admiration,
Zaid
December 3, 2019 at 8:18 pm
Dear Zaid,
Writing about my fears was a scary experience.
I’m glad you loved it.
I will definitely expand upon this when my heart agrees with me.
Love,
Tolu.
November 7, 2019 at 8:30 pm
Dear Tolu
Thank you so much for writing this very personal piece about fear as its something that every single human being struggles with at some point in their life. I can definitely relate to most if all of the fears you listed. I really like the direct way you displayed your fears as if you where listing them off one by one, and not trying to sugar coat anything.
Some grows to work on could be weird wording such as this sentence “That I may set her to doom before greatness”. Also the ending was very abrupt and needs something more. But other than that I loved this short and sweet poem.
-Savannah
January 8, 2020 at 12:30 am
Dear Tolu,
where was I when you write this? How come I sit beside the best writer and I can’t manage to get a line down, and the beautiful person beside me has written this.
I admire this piece so much Tolu because I didn’t know we were afraid of the same things. The unbearing amount of stress school brings us is something I feel like will always be apart of me and fear of failure comes with this. We work so hard as students to pass only to go pay thousands of dollars for an education we are gaining for the pure purpose of passing, so basically our future is stress, money, and being scared.
Okay, the fear of having children, when I just read that, I was like, no I can’t be scared to have kids because I literally wanted kids since I was one. The idea of growing a human inside of me always amazed me and the emotional attachment is what I look forward to more than anything because they say there is no relationship like mothers and her kids. Then I kept reading as you wrote that you’re scared of being someones everything, and you’re right, that’s scary. Always having to be the strong one and being there, but I feel like it won’t be as much fear as it will be a blessing when you have the child because your life changes when your baby is in your hands.
I have the same fear of driving. I think it’s crazy that your life could end on the road because of a stranger. Driving is basically you putting yourself at risk, and being a risk to everyone else, even if you’re being a cautious driver,, you never know what someone is doing behind the wheels.
Death is a generic fear. It’s fear of the unknown, fear of leaving and never returning, fear of being gone. I think I’m more curious about death than scared of it for many reasons (which I should write a post about hehe).
tolu, thank you for writing this so much. I’ve never related more to fewer lies in my life, and your use of repetition really inforced the message and it came across more than perfect. I look forward to reading more of your work in the future because I hope we all use these blogs beyond this class because I feel like we all grew because of it.
okay, I’m done, sorry for all the reading (:
Love, Sarah 3
January 9, 2020 at 8:58 pm
My Sarah,
I believe that these similarities indeed make us the best friends.
I couldn’t believe I was actually putting my fears out for the world to see.
It makes me feel less scared that you empathize with me.
You have my entire heart.
I love you.
With love,
Tolu.