“The Things You Run Away From Are Inside You.”

I remember clearly the moment I decided to share my work online, and how I almost didn’t.

Despite dreaming of the countless upsides of doing so, I’d always run from the idea the minute I landed on it.

I was afraid of rejection, of falling in front of others and having no one around to pick me up. Not even myself.

So I ran.

I ran from all the thoughts and emotions that would wrestle with me to take that first step. I just couldn’t overcome them.

Over time, I’ve discovered that the very things we run from are within us.

So when we run from that which scares us, we’re only running from our own fear. That worry was never something to run away from but rather, something to confront within.

We talk about overcoming fear as though it’s a material thing, as though we can wrap our hands around it and subdue it. And we use our imagination to conjure up this overwhelming burden, absolving our responsibility to tackle its true source, us.

When I finally faced those fears and shared my first blog post online, I always saw it as having armed myself for battle.

But what I recently discovered was that I had actually done the complete opposite: disarmed my defence system.

The saying couldn’t be more true:

“The things you run away from are inside you.” — Seneca

So with this realisation comes good and bad news — it both starts and ends with us.