Maybe Not Confident...But At Least Curious

As some of you may have read, I was feeling a bit "can't-ish" last night.

After some further reflection today, I have realized that it's the board breaking that is in my head.  My goal for the Tiger Challenge is not to win.  My goal is to showcase my ability.  I think where my fear comes with the board breaking is that I don't know what that is.  I've never broken a real board.  I've never done any in sequence.  I've never done any in a "competition" type atmosphere.  These "nevers" have made this into a bigger deal than it needs to be. 

A few things have managed to ground me once again.

• Even as I pressed "publish" for my blog last night, I felt a hint better.  The act of blogging, and writing out my negative feelings, was a step towards ridding myself of them.  They didn't seem to have as much power over me once I put them to "paper".
• Sihing Cosgrove's comment in the IHC chat group.  
• I was talking to a parent this morning.  Her son is feeling very nervous about the Tiger Challenge.  As we spoke...everything we came up with as reminders or strategies for her son to feel less nervous or worried also applied to me.
• The friendly and supportive comments from my team. Thank-you for pointing out that I am overthinking it and that I shouldn't worry about "failing" or not having things go exactly how I want.  It's rare things ever do.  All I can do is take everything I've learned and practiced up until now and put forth my best effort.

And so although I wouldn't say I'm back to feeling confident about my board breaks, I would say I'm at least feeling curious.  I'll take it.  Lol.