Feel the fear and do it anyway...

This is our current motto. It seems like I need to repeat it to myself about 100 times a day. There is so much going on right now of which I am afraid....terrified...scared to death. I have to remind myself that being scared is not a reason to quit.

The store opens tomorrow. We have spent the last two days stocking shelves, I'm heading over there soon to spend the third day stocking shelves. A mind-numbing, back aching process. I look forward to being done with this part of things. I haven't really been scared about this business venture (I was scared about the loan closing, but not scared about the business). I'm scared now. Tomorrow, we find out what will be. We've done a lot of leg work leading up to tomorrow - I believe we are prepared - we've done advertising, community events, told the world what we are doing...now we see who was listening. Obviously it doesn't end tomorrow - it actually all begins. And while that is exciting, it is also so very scary.

We have our second triathlon coming up on Sept 6th - I'm scared of that too. Maybe more so than of the first because I know what's in store. I've been sticking to my training. We did a swim in the lake where the event will be held and I think my nerves will be a little more at ease in the swim - I don't expect the swim to be any easier, I just hope not to be so scared.

There is so much going on at my job right now. They announced a huge buyout on Friday. It will be interesting to see where the cards land on that one - I am not eligible for the buyout - so I'll be left behind to pick up the pieces. That is scary because I expect my job to be transformed, I expect the company to be transformed. We've been through a lot of that in the last few years and I wonder how much more we can do before we stop actually being a newspaper. Will I tell my great nieces and nephews someday "there used to be these things called newspapers....and I worked there!" This kind of puts some extra pressure on our business. I used to think that newspapers would be around forever....now it seems like newspapers are doing whatever they can to kill themselves. I'm not ready to give up on them yet, because I love them, but I worry about the future.

I could go on and on about the things that occupy my mind. And you would probably say "worrying won't make them better" and you would be right. If you could give me advice on how not to worry about them...I'd give you a year's subscription to the newspaper.