“What If I Show Up?”
By: Christie Alex Costello
Tags: Self Improvement, Self Love, Advice, Success, Confidence

The bell rung. My horse jolted forward a bit too quickly, which increased the nervous feeling already planted in my gut. Imposter syndrome would seem almost like an understatement at this point. I was on a horse pretending to be a professional equestrian in a massive arena with people videoing, clients watching, and a horse I knew wanted nothing more than to leave the stadium.

The bell became quiet, and Zac, the horse underneath me, moved quickly toward the first fence in the stadium. In my mind, I knew that Zac was given to me by the client after dumping her (or stopping to push the rider off over the horses head) on multiple occasions. I was on this horse to help him get over his fear of the arena and perform with confidence. But what is a girl to do when like the horse, I too wanted nothing more than to play it small and leave the ring almost the moment I stepped into it?

Deep breath in. Deep breath out.

In my head, I repeated the trainer’s advice and moved Zac’s speed a little more forward than I was naturally comfortable with. The best equestrians allow their discomfort to fuel their forward motion into execution.

As we approached the first fence, Zac hesitated, but I pushed him over, and we continued on the course. After a spooky turn in the far right corner of the arena that sent him sideways, we took a strange angle to the second jump but corrected and squared up for the third and fourth fence.

I was now beginning to feel comfortable and trusting in Zac’s performance. I turned toward the intimidating bounce circuit fences that were stacked with just enough space for two jumps with a step in between. At that moment, I felt doubt. I knew people were watching. I knew this was the hardest part of the course. I had friends watching me from out of town. I had people cheering for me.

I blew it.

We barely made it over the first jump of the bounce. The moment following the first fence, Zac came to a screeching halt, and I flew over his head onto the dirt below. I was embarrassed. I had failed the client, embarrassed my coach, and made my friends watching feeling a little discomfort and possibly pity.

I decide to show up small.

I didn’t get into that ring, believing I would win. I knew that I would fall before the timer even started. I had written in my mind a story of fear and failure before the events had even begun. This wasn’t a new trend in my habits. I had allowed failure on multiple occasions to paralyze my efforts. I stopped. I froze. I. Played. Small.

The hardest part of playing small?

I had to do it again and again and again. For many years, failure became my narrative. Whenever I got great at something, I let people down. God forbid I go 9–0, I got in my head and went 8–4 instead within only days of being undefeated. My failure wasn’t because I didn’t have the capabilities; this failure happened because I had already planned to not believe in my potential. The hardest part of playing small was knowing that I could have done better.

When we look at an invitation to be seen, we have to choose: Are we going to show up? Or are we going to play small and remain unmemorable, unsuccessful, and forever unseen?

I learned the hard way on the ground that day that I had engineered my life to be small and unseen. The hard dirt and my ego both received the weight of my fall, and while on the ground, I took on a valuable lesson:

I had to decide that winning wasn’t a time card or a ribbon or 1st place…Winning was believing that I had the authority to do incredible things.

Today, I live a little differently than I did in those moments, but it took a hard thud in front of hundreds of people to decide…

I want to show up and stop living small.

I am worthy of being seen, and so are you.