My 9-Year Vulnerability Hangover

This video is really hard for me to watch. It’s from exactly 10 years ago today.

I made 30 videos in the 30 days leading up to my 27th birthday. My goal was to inspire others to step out of their own comfort zones and share their hearts too.

I honestly had no idea what I was doing. But I felt something inside of me that so badly wanted to be expressed.

When I completed the 30-day challenge and realized how far I was from my comfort zone, I had the biggest vulnerability hangover of my life. These videos didn’t go viral or make me famous, so I assumed the project was a failure and that nobody liked me.

A voice in my head told me, “Nobody gives a shit. Now shut up and promise you’ll never do that again!”

Ouch!

To protect myself from feeling this ashamed and embarrassed ever again, I made myself smaller and smaller, eventually disappearing from video for almost 9 years.

I didn’t even know I was hiding. I did not want to admit it. I tried to forget the whole thing ever happened.

It has taken me a lot of work to be able to record and share videos weekly like I do now. A LOT OF WORK. It’s easy to forget about the work-which includes this 30-day video challenge-because it hurts to look back.

When I hear myself speak in these old videos I can feel all the ways I was holding back. I can see how I was trying to be someone I thought the world wanted, and not who I really was.

I remember these videos as being a massive failure. But the truth is, these videos were massive stepping stones that needed to happen to get me to where I am today. And while a part of me still feels uncomfortable looking back, and I cringe at how nasally his voice sounds (and this is one of the better videos from this series), I am grateful for the work that younger Darius put in.

For his courage.

For his heart.

And of course, for his thick head of hair. ;)

Originally published at http://www.dariusbashar.com on December 19, 2019.