Endings are a good time to reflect, and given both Nightlight Blues and my university semester ended this week, I think this is a good time to do some reflecting.

Many of us fear starting something new. Specifically, we fear the idea of starting something new because we fear the potential of failure; the fear of unfamiliarity and change. And that fear, as far as I know, is something that has increased slightly over time since the advent of social media and the internet, perhaps because it's so much easier to see only the best parts of the lives of people around us and believe that others are living a perfect life and therefore, we need to do the same. I don't know; I'm not a sociologist, and neither do I particularly want to be.

All I know for certain is that starting something new for the first time is a daunting thought for many of us, myself included. I've started a lot of things for the first time over the last three months; the most major of which being this website and the business that it represents. I'd be dishonest to say that I wasn't worried; the creative industry is one that is famous for being incredibly competitive, fickle, and difficult to succeed in, and reading is an industry that seems to be dying with each passing year (though, I and many others who have actually looked at the industry figures would tend to disagree on whether and how much the industry is actually dying). But even that aside, this year was the first time I've shared my writing beyond my closest friends, the first time I've started university, the first time I've had to be as much of a socialite as I have been, et cetera, et cetera.

So I suppose that brings up the question of how. How do you start something new, for the first time, and not fear it?

The answer is pretty simple, as most things in life are. To start something new, you have to stop fearing it. And that means you have to stop fearing failure, defeat, and humiliation. That's easier said than done, but at least it's not a complicated problem to solve. You don't have to do calculus or learn how to program or win a nobel prize to do something for the first time. You just have to be willing to fail.

Personally, I'd consider Darkholm Project to be on a pretty good trajectory so far. At the very least, everyone who's read Nightlight Blues so far has returned positive feedback, so I'm clearly not quite as terrible of an author as I once feared that I am. But it could have been much worse. People might not have liked it, or worse, they might just have not cared. In other words, Darkholm Project could have failed even before it really got started. It still might fail once it leaves closed beta, and I have to start distributing my writing to a larger public audience.

The thought of that does scare me a little. I don't enjoy failing at things that I care about, by any means. And the same applies to all of the things that I did for the first time this year, and not everything has been quite as successful as my writing. Overcoming a fear of failure doesn't mean only doing things when you're certain of your success. In fact, to avoid fear and failure at all costs is arguably the height of cowardice; you can never grow by staying exactly in your comfort zone.

I've found that it helps to remember that failure is inevitable. Because honestly, you will suck when you start something for the first time. I sucked at everything I did for the first time, and I've made some pretty bad mistakes as well. Hell, I'm sure I'll regret this website in six months when I realize just how amateur it really is because I've improved. The process of improvement is built entirely upon seeing your failures and doing better the next time around.

So there's two ways to look behind you. You can either see a laundry list of everything you've done wrong; each mistake another reason why you should stop. Or you can see a path to all of your successes, because each failure is a stepping stone for your own improvement. Different interpretations of the same history, but with two very different conclusions.

To stop fearing, to stop failing, is a fool's errand. In fact, don't stop fearing, don't stop failing. Fear, fail, and then do it anyway. Because a person can only be brave if he feels fear, but pushes through anyway.