(Feature Image pulled from Jon Acuff’s website for Start)
It’s no secret that I’m an introvert who’s really good at pretending to be an extrovert.
When I think about large groups and uncomfortable social situations…my palms get sweaty. My heart races. Sometimes I get light headed.
But when I have time to prepare…time to craft a message…I do much better. Which is why I like you, internet. I can lurk. I can participate. I can type and re-read emails and tweets before they get sent.
This is all seemingly neither here nor there. But I signed up for Jon Acuff’s “Start Experiment” a while back. I can’t remember the post exactly but he posted on his blog a post for 24-hours only for people who wanted to join a group of others for an experiment.
I hesitated sending the email with my contact details. What was I signing up for? What if it was too hard? Too time consuming and demanding? But then I remembered what life is about. Risks. Opportunities. And just like a 24-hour Kate Spade secret sale (we all know I can’t pass them up), I was there. I hit send.
Flash forward a bit and I’m in a closed group on Facebook 2,600+ strong of other people like me (not socially anxious, I mean, other Starters). Besides that, I’m in a small group and have an accountability partner for the next 24 days.
It makes connecting, something I sometimes struggle with, easier. It forces me to participate. To raise my hand like when I was in school. I contemplated making a website badge and wanted to ask the group if there was interest…so I did. I hesitated for about .5 seconds (what if everyone thought it was a dumb idea?) but then realized…it’s time to just put myself out there. We all know haters gonna hate but I don’t think this is a group of 2,600 haters. It’s a family of 2,600.
I’m excited for the next 24 days. I obviously hope to work on my goal but if nothing else…I hope to make some friends, learn a lot, and punch fear in the face.
xx
P.S. I’ll be blogging a LOT in the coming days. Just a heads up. I’ll probably use the same feature image and tag (#StartExp) each time so you can ignore them if you’re not interested!