Every year the largest educational conference in Canada is hosted by a different university from across the country. This year the conference was held in Toronto at the school where I completed both my Masters and PhD. From a personal brand and marketing standpoint my attendance at this thing was a no brainer. A win win. I could attend without having to pay for accommodations or airfare (these conferences aren’t cheap!) and get to present to an audience for whom my new book was actually written (educators!).
“I looked for your name in the program,” read the email.
“Ya, this just wasn’t the year for me…” I wrote back.
But my response was a lie. It was the year for me. And yet I didn’t go. Here’s why: fear.
I don’t feel good admitting to that feeling, but here we are. Another Good Enough written and shared to help me make sense of myself — and perhaps offer something to you in the process. Maybe this post is pedagogy of care in action. Self-care that is. For I’m not naive. When you’ve been rejected enough times by academic book presses, and have lived through countless “no thanks” emails from editors who sit on the other side of your heartfelt pitches, you start to see the world with a different sort of clarity. Over the years I have come to a place where I recognize that not everyone will relate to my ideas. In fact, I know that it’s healthy when people don’t, and then offer pushback. That’s often what learning looks like for me — being prompted to try again, to sharpen a good idea into a point that lands.
But this conference was different somehow. Scarier. Not something I could intellectualize away. It was close to home and connected to a time when I was different. Back then I was newer, less world weary, a little too brave and so clueless to the biting nature of academic relations. The we’ll-put-you-in-your-placeness of it all. The anticipation of “rigour” that I learned over time devolves into the ugliness of competition. The conference attendees would have been people I hadn’t seen in years, but who I had stayed connected to from afar via social media. These were thinkers I cared about, whose biting Twitter tongues I did not have the fortitude to be at the receiving end of. Not this year. Even with experience and some hard-won emotional armour, those 280 characters could break my heart.
So I didn’t go. And now, a week after all of the conference pictures have been posted online and everyone’s gone home, I’m left with the after effects of my fear.
What’s the learning here for me? I missed an opportunity for self-promotion with this decision. But, at the same time, I listened to my body and that’s something I’ve not always been good at. I’m reminded of Sarah Polley’s book title: Run Towards the Danger. In general, I agree with her and have lived that way much of my life. But the care I showed myself in choosing not to make this very specific run…choosing instead to avoid danger by standing still…well, that’s also of value.
I’ve also read that fear is connected to wisdom (Job said it first and then Sherlock Holmes).
So there’s that.
Tea spilled. The learning continues.
Wow....Lord I'm so amazed....yes step out and humble defea fear, especially when its a right worked for and well deserved. It amazed me how we all got more than enough yet we shy away from the accolade of the reward....
Hi N. Can I just say how brave this article is. Self-care at the expense of opportunites is often a difficult concept for some to grasp; Yes, there will be a part of you that may see the post-event comments and pictures on one/more social media platforms, but this conference has prompted to you to share bits and pieces of your journey - where you were those years ago, and yes, potentially the naivety that may have served you well - when you were not where you are today. Fear can be riveting, but it is also motivational. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. stated wisely that "courage is the power of the mind to overcome fear," and clearly you are a lioness!