Conquering Your Fears

Have you ever been scared to do something even though you really wanted to do it?  Maybe you were nervous to take the training wheels off your bike.  Or perhaps you weren't sure about swinging across the entire row of monkey bars.

Today I was cleaning the gutters around my house.  I always clean the gutters in the front of my house because I can easily get to them by climbing out a window and standing on our porch roof.  Bill always cleans the gutters on the side of our house because they are really high up and you have to climb a ladder to get to them.

Well today after cleaning the gutters in the front of the house I decided that I would conquer my fears of being on a high ladder and clean the gutters on the side of the house.  Now, I don't mind being up high and I don't mind ladders that are only 3 or 4 steps.  But I don't feel comfortable up high on a ladder.  I started out slow . . . securing the ladder on the ground and wall . . . climbing carefully . . . working small areas at a time.  By the time I was halfway down the side of the house I was feeling pretty good.  When I reached the end I was feeling so good that I decided to trim the apple tree that had some limbs hanging over the gutter.  When I was almost finished the job Bill drove down the driveway and was so surprised to see me up on a high ladder cutting limbs off the tree that he snapped a couple pictures of me!

I felt so great after finishing the job, knowing that I had done something that was really hard for me and I did it well.

Have you ever tried something that was hard for you or scary?  Having someone help you conquer your fears can be super helpful as well, and then you can both celebrate in the end!!