Considerations | Fear of Failure | Part 1

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A few days ago something happened to me that made me think...

It turns out I applied for a job on the Internet. I had the opportunity to hand in my CV and a couple more papers to a company abroad to work as a flute and music theory teacher on-line. It took a week to respond and in the meantime, I didn't give it much thought and went about my business.

It was really an arrow I shot without much interest, I mean, the quarantine has made me have moments where I don't have much workflow and I start to worry, but overall, compared to others, I feel quite lucky to be able to keep making music for others and working with close colleagues.

I got the answer to the application yesterday, I was rejected.

I felt so bad!

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That was a big drama! A sense of suffocation, a feeling that the world was ending (even though it really wasn't and that companies like that are sure to be around for a while...) I tried to talk to myself and convince myself that there was no danger, that the fear was unfounded and that I would go on with my life, trying again and again. The stress became a stinging headache. On a day that was stressful enough already, it was the worst of starts.

I got the news at about 7:00 AM.

It was recording day, an excellent violist was coming to the studio to record a couple of songs for different clients. It was an exhausting session, I thought that the mouthpieces only suffocated when you were walking quickly, but if you use them in a closed place and for long periods of time, they can become terribly uncomfortable.

When I finished recording, I noticed how the headache became more pronounced, throbbing, in sync with the tempo of the recording. I realized that I had to put a stop to this, that I had to confront myself to see what was going on inside me that was so upsetting. I knew that the pain had begun just from reading the rejection letter for the work I applied, but I didn't know any further than that. So I grabbed a couple of old bags and decided to go to the supermarket.

I went to the one that was farthest away from everyone. For 30 minutes I walked around reflecting on what had happened, there was something dark in that pain, in the deep anguish I felt. Even though it was my first application for a job of this kind, and in the current virtual conditions, I felt I had experienced it before. That fear, that pain, was disturbingly familiar.

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A little history to put it in context...

In the second part of this chronicle...