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Fear and need
July 04, 2006
There is this bit in Lily Burana’s forthcoming novel (which I have read and you have not because I am a magazine editor and therefore special), TRY (out on July 11) that has stuck with me over the weeks since I read it. I don’t have the text in front of me, but to paraphrase without butchering the meaning, the context of the scene is a young woman freshly out of college is starting to fall and be fallen for by an older cowboy, and there is this moment where she recognizes, as Burana puts it, the “fear and need” in his eyes. And it’s just – so beautiful, and something that I am beginning to get in a big way.
I have worked so hard pretty much all my life to conceal my fear and need, but I know more and more that that mask is by no means airtight, and it all just leaks out the edges and reveals itself anyway. Maybe even in a more burning and desparatescary way than if I was more honest about my fears and needs.
Its interesting the ways that the professional and personal tangle together in this for me – sometimes I think I’m much more capable of professional achievement than I am of personal achievement (I wrote about that about two months ago – here), and I’m trying really hard to pursue personal openness and awesomeness. I know its absurd in some ways, but I’m starting with what I know I can do, and that which I feel more motivated to do well at – the professional.
When I curated Sex Worker Visions, I didn’t ask for help. I delegated last minute tasks (ack! I need someone to get the wall text printed! Ack! this frame broke and I need a new one!), but otherwise I very stubbornly did the whole goddamn thing myself. Not for want of volunteers, but for want of asking.
And now I am learning a lot from making this movie – namely that I cannot and should not do this on my own. Not just because it is preposterous to run the whole show on my own (which is true) but also because the final product will be ten or fifty times more awesome if I ask for other awesome people’s help, input and creative awesomeness. Yes, collaboration is risky – any number of these people I’m counting on could flake out or fuck me over and whatnot, but that is a risk worth taking - hey kids, that’s life!
That’s life. And I should take my own goddamned advice, and translate this wisdom from my professional life to my personal life. And I think I am, but it’s freaky. Constructive criticism in the professional realm – I’m all for it, I get pumped up on it, even when its somewhat harsh. But in my personal life – I’m full of so much fear that sometimes it masks my need (or I think it does), staunches my ability to pose the tough questions, pumps me up full of cool-acting when I’m anything but.
The thing is – I am so afraid of seeming weak and needy, but I haven’t been able to figure out precisely what is so terrible about needing. Probably my world will fall apart and people will scoff behind my back about what a lame-o and an overemotional basketcase of a girl I am (in my imagination, where everyone is pointing and laughing). Or my dreams (the secret ones that aren’t at all out of the ordinary, the ones I fear most) will come true, my needs will be fulfilled, and that will be the scariest thing of all.
Posted by Dacia at July 4, 2006 12:32 AM
Comments
Take this for what its worth… someone who is capable of doing the job themselves, but smart enough to better direct their energies plans ahead.
Someone who is good only for telling others what to do needs to ask for help.
The difference between the two is that the former, if they are unable to obtain asssitance, or said assistance falls through, is perfectly capable of performing the work themselves.
The difference between good planning, and weak/needy, is that good planning delegates ahead of time, so the issue of competence never comes up.
Unless you plan on drafting the plans for your next home yourself, rather than using an Architecht? Never eating in a resturaunt ever again, but always cooking for yourself? Same principle.
Posted by: David at July 4, 2006 01:07 PM
Yes, I absolutely get the fear of being that “overemotional basketcase girl” because, more often than not, I am that girl.
But maybe we could just be that girl and stick together, and that way instead of people all around us rolling their eyes and scoffing, we’d be surrounded by people who get it and decide to hold our hands, instead.
I mean, say what you will, but we are certainly not the only crazy bitches in NYC.
xxoo CB
Posted by: Cherry Bomb at July 5, 2006 11:13 AM
Audacia…I admit, I don’t read every day, but every time I do, I’m glad of it. Sometimes you write things that are so dead on it’s almost upsetting to read, depending on my mood… I’m hopefully going to be in NYC fairly soon - I’d love to see you again, even just to grab a coffee…
Posted by: khavi at July 5, 2006 12:56 PM
