Richard Oliver of the San Antonio Express-News quoted Tiger Woods on whether he was nervous about returning to competitive golf after an 8-month layoff while he recovered from knee surgery:
"The day I'm not nervous is the day I quit," Woods said. "To me, nerves are great. That means you care. (But) that's the greatest thing about it is just to feel that, to feel that rush."
That perspective reminds me of John Lahr's New Yorker interview with acting coach Susan Batson and her comments on stagefright:
I'm always terrified of the person who doesn't have [stagefright], because it means that the commitment is not fully there.
I find something very compelling about this approach to fear--and that's what it is, whether we call it "nerves" or "stagefright" or anything else. Rather than resisting our fear or pretending it's not there, we can acknowledge it and embrace it. Rather than view our fear as a harbinger of failure, we can re-frame it as evidence of our caring, our commitment, and view it as a precursor to success.
I'm not saying I've mastered this perspective shift--not at all. But I am finding that whenever I feel fear and "lean into it" rather than "back away from it," I tend to learn and grow a lot more. Of course, that doesn't mean I have fun in the process.
