I often struggle with a deep and very personal form of cowardice, particularly in asking for things.  For instance, I have to collect signatures as a part of my involvement in political activity.  This means that I have to wander up to people, often to their homes, and ask them to sign a piece of paper saying that I should be placed on the ballot.  In Massachusetts at least, you cannot get on a ballot without these signatures.

I am positively terrified of collecting signatures.  I have all the necessary tools to find registered voters- I just find myself paralyzed by the thought of asking people to sign the paper.  In practice, once I get going, I can usually do pretty well, successfully collecting signatures from about 90% of the people I talk to.  It’s fear that is the problem.

Given the infinitesimal possibility of personal harm, the fear is illogical and unconscionable. In short, it is cowardice.  I can’t even excuse it as a phobia, since I lack the intense physiological reactions assorted with phobia.  It’s not a mental illness- rather it is a personal weakness.

As I discussed in Freedom From Fear, this is an ongoing battle for me.  When I succumb to cowardice, I severely limit my impactfulness to a level far below my potential.  I’m fairly certain that my unwillingness to campaign door-to-door last year was a contributing factor to my defeat in the general election.  Had I pushed through my pusillanimity, I would probably have mopped the floor with my opponent.  Instead I staked the entire campaign on a debate performance (usually a strong point) and some last minute radio ads.

I could plead exhaustion from various stressors in my life- certainly they sapped my energy; but, ultimately the failure was in my will to face up to a positively ludicrous fear of asking people for things.  At the end of the day, that’s what it boils down to.  I find it a lot easier to ask for things on someone else’s behalf than on my own.

Why is it so much easier for me to say “we” did something instead of “I”?  Is it because of a latent desire to spread the blame?  Is it a culturally-instilled need to “lift all boats”?  Or, is it simply that I don’t feel worthy to ask?

If this is true, my timorousness may stem from self-doubt, the belief that I am somehow less than other people.  While I certainly am more overweight and less physically fit than many people, I have people constantly trying to praise me.  After all, the vast majority of people in the world have never run for any office, let alone eight times.  Fewer still have ever won an election and served a term of office.

How many people have ever founded a hobbyists’ convention?  How many of those people can say that their convention was strong enough to continue growing after they stepped down from leadership, ultimately running for about a decade longer?  How many people have been paid for writing articles for a national magazine?  How many people have ever signed a book deal (even if it was ultimately cancelled)?

How many people have climbed the Tooth of Time?  How many have placed in a national photography competition?  How many…

Well, it seems arrogant to go on.  I could, ad nauseum, but I feel uncomfortable saying good things about myself.  It’s as if Montréal looked in the mirror and saw Cuidad Juárez.  I suspect that this is a learned behavior.  After all, children are generally unafraid to ask (okay, demand) the things they want.  Few children are born with a low self-esteem.

I am starting to believe that this feeling is not autodidactic, but rather imposed from outside through a brutal and socially self-destructive system of intentional abuse.  While it probably starts during the elementary school ages, I think it really strikes during the middle school years.

Unfortunately, well-meaning psychologists and child advocates seem to have adopted a Harrison Bergeron approach to this problem.  Rather than attacking the abuse, they’ve instead directed their energy towards an “everyone is equally good” approach.  While this might seem positive on the surface, I’m deeply troubled by the results.

Look at this from a child’s perspective.  If we are all equally good and I can throw a ball better than someone else, then throwing a ball must not be worthwhile.  I can obviously see that my ball toss went further and more accurately that my fellow students’, but I’m not allowed to brag about it.  In fact, my teacher punishes me for calling attention to my success.  She claims that I’m hurting the other students’ feelings.  Therefore, my prowess must not be worthwhile.  It might even be bad.

That’s not to say that we should encourage a Darwinian mindset in our classrooms, rather that we need to stop focusing on punishing success and start encouraging it.  What we need to crack down on is abuse, both top-down and bottom-up.  We cannot tolerate the poor throwers vilifying the good throwers any more than we can abide the good ball throwers mistreating the poor throwers.

This should be the foundation of our society’s war on self-doubt, not some namby-pamby well-meaning blarney from people who should know better.  The results of their misguided experiment are now being suffered by a third generation of Americans.  It needs to stop.

So, what about those of us who have already been pulled down by peer abuse and a bunch of adults who didn’t really understand what was happening?  That’s the toughy.  For me, it’s about challenging myself.  Unfortunately, that requires energy, particularly mental and spiritual energy to overcome that first speed bump of fear.

Worse still, overcoming it today doesn’t mean that I won’t have to wrestle with it tomorrow. Every time I need to ask for something for myself, I run smack into that same cowardice, that same sense that I’m not good enough to receive what I want.  That’s probably why I’m still earning half of what Information Week says I should be earning.

So, I continue to do the best I can with what I have, and I continue to work at doing it better the next time.

Even though it’s still difficult to collect signatures, I am getting a lot better at it.  I’m also getting a lot more people’s help.  In truth, each time I push myself through this, it gets a teeny-tiny bit easier.  Over the years, though, that indiscernible creep upwards is making the speed bumps seem less high.

I guess that’s really the only cure for self-doubt and the cowardice it encourages- not simply time, but time spent challenging myself to do better in spite of my fear.