What’s your favorite form of self-sabotage?

Life is either a daring adventure or nothing. Security does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than exposure. – Helen Keller

The desire for safety stands against every great and noble enterprise. – Tacitus, Roman philosopher

This past weekend, I became irrationally excited about going to see The Rum Diary, a movie starring Johnny Depp, based on a book by Hunter S. Thompson. While I like Johnny Depp, I’m not obsessed with him (which increases my status as an “oddball,” I know). I don’t go to see a movie just because he is in it or anything (and when I see a Pirates movie, I keep thinking that he really needs a bath).

I told people that the reason I wanted to go was because I LOVED Hunter S. Thompson’s writing.  That’s what I honestly thought. And, someone logically asked me, “What are you favorite books?” Hmmm. I didn’t have an answer. I do own one of his books but I hadn’t touched it in over a decade. I couldn’t remember the name of it, either. Maybe that wasn’t why I was obsessed with seeing the movie as soon as it came out.

So, I was very curious as I walked into the matinee of The Rum Diary. The movie was funny and reminded me of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas but with slightly less highs and a lot more rum. Although clumsy in places, it was enjoyable. I still wasn’t sure why I had wanted to go, except that maybe I’m a writer, and that Hunter S. Thompson is a writer.

When people asked how it was, I said it wasn’t as good as Fear and Loathing, and then, I got into many discussions about how great that movie was. The next day, I checked out the Fear and Loathing DVD from the library. I had only seen it once, despite my claims that I loved it so much. When I started watching it, I remembered WHY I had only seen it once. The movie “gives me The Fear.” How did these men not OD? Or kill themselves with random guns, knives, cars, while high? How did they not drown? Electrocute themselves while taking a bath with appliances running all around them? I almost didn’t watch the entire movie because I was so nervous. But, I felt compelled to, just as I’d been compelled to go see The Rum Diary.

After a nerve-wracking two hours, I raced to read about Hunter S. Thompson’s life. I knew he’d been a writer, used lots of drugs, liked guns and killed himself with a shotgun while on the phone with his wife. That was about it. I pulled up the first biography I found online, and lo and behold, he was from Kentucky! I am from Kentucky. Ok, there are lots of people from Kentucky but this struck me as synchronous since I was searching for why I was suddenly obsessed with this man. I already knew that Johnny Depp was from Kentucky. So, some connection or message about my ROOTS?

The next day, I smelled cigarette smoke in my house. Very odd. I don’t smoke. No one has ever smoked in here. I mentioned it in an online spiritual group, and the conversation veered toward Shamans, and how some use tobacco and whiskey for spiritual enlightenment.  Hunter S. Thompson came up AGAIN! Others did not know he was from Kentucky either, and I joked that it’s probably the reason he liked guns so much.

Today (Tuesday), I’m taking the bus into UNC Chapel Hill’s campus, to do some research at the library (for the book I’m working on about the suffragist Lucy Burns). I pick up a Newsweek, open it randomly, and there’s an article about….the friendship between Johnny Depp and Hunter S. Thompson.  In one of the opening paragraphs, Johnny describes his first visit to Hunter’s house, “…I noticed this beautiful nickel-plated 12-gauge shotgun on his wall. I was raised around weapons all my life, being from Kentucky, so I said, ‘Wow, that’s a really good-looking 12-gauge.’ And he said, ‘Would you like to fire it?’” Hunter also called Johnny, “Colonel Depp” because of their Kentucky connection. (It’s an honor to be a Kentucky Colonel, and it has nothing to do with fried chicken. Several members of my family have the official title.)

What really hit me as I read the article, though, was the description of how a young Thompson would type and retype The Great Gatsby, just so he’d know what it felt like to type a masterpiece. I did the same thing. With the same book! (Although, I don’t think I ever typed it out fully once, much less multiple times.)

Driving home this afternoon, I was mulling over all the sychronicities (when it comes to synchronicities, if YOU think they are significant, they are). What message was I getting from all of this? I immediately thought of Hunter’s lack of control when under the influence.  He also wrote some of his best stuff while high.  Miraculously, he never got hurt. Well, just when this thought popped into my brain, a woman on the radio announced the birthday of Anthony Kiedis the lead singer of the Red Hot Chili Peppers. And she said, “Have you read his memoir? I don’t know how he’s survived with all the drugs he took.” AHA.

No, I’m not going to start taking drugs. Or getting high to write. What I feared, when I watched Fear and Loathing, and The Rum Diary was the chaos. The VULNERABILITY. The seeming randomness of Hunter’s life. But, the chaos brought him great insight (as did the drugs, but we’ll set that aside for now), and it was the chaos that forged his great writing. Not only that, the CHAOS DID NOT KILL HIM.

How do you self-sabotage?

You know how some people self-sabotage by quitting jobs they love and are good at, or by breaking up with someone, even though the relationship is going great? Their greatest fear is commitment, and they’ll avoid it, even at personal expense.

MY greatest fear is lack of control. When I can’t control things, I FREAK OUT. Of course, control is just an illusion but telling myself that makes me freak out even more. I self-sabotage by going for safety. Every time. In jobs. In relationships. In, well, everything. Or, I used to until the Universe no longer let me!

This website scares the hell of me. I’ve talked about this many times before.  Will I ever make a full living at this? Will people think I’m nuts? Will it hurt my reputation? But, I keep doing it anyway. Writing a book scares the hell out of me too. What if I put in months or years or work and no one ever publishes it? Or, I self publish and no one reads it? What if I run out of money? What if…

But, I’m doing it anyway. I’m embracing the mystery that’s out there, no longer going for the “sure thing” (which wasn’t so sure anyway, as evidenced by my layoff, my divorce…).

And, the Universe is providing me assurance! Not guarantees but support.  I have actually been asking (begging!) for help with my fear, so that I could courageously follow my path, and not self-sabotage, yet again. I just didn’t expect the support to come in the form of a drug-using, gun-toting writer from Kentucky!

The Kentucky bit (or, at least, my “roots”) is important too, for what I’m doing and what I’m writing. I grew up, fully immersed in fundamentalist culture, but this site is anything but. I have a unique perspective, which is important for a writer.  I haven’t yet worked out all the other messages. The gun is “power,” maybe? I should definitely reread some of Thompson’s books! (I had to laugh when I checked one out of the county library today, and the cover shows the back of a nude Thompson, shooting a gun. The book, by the way, is Kingdom of Fear. Yes, I have much to learn.)

The point of this story? The moral, so to speak? If you embrace the mystery, the mystery will rally to support you, in ways you may never expect. You just have to step into it with your eyes wide open, or else you’ll miss the signs. Look directly at The Fear. That’s courage.