Being Scared Doesn’t Mean You’re on the Wrong Path
Nobody warned me about what would happen after I launched my first book.
For months, I had something to focus on. I was writing. Revisiting parts of my life I hadn’t thought about in years. Trying to put into words what happened to me, what I learned, and how God brought me through it.
Then Something Only God Could Do came out.
At first, there was a lot of excitement.
Friends and family were reaching out. Reviews and royalties started rolling in. People were telling me they connected with the book. After spending so much time wondering whether anyone would care about my story, that felt pretty darn good.
It certainly gave my ego a boost.
And then the newness wore off.
Suddenly, I wasn’t writing the book anymore. The launch was over.
And I was left with a different question:
Now what?
When Excitement Turns Into Self-Doubt
My media strategist encouraged me to keep sharing. Keep talking about the things I wrote about. Keep putting myself out there.
But I started second-guessing everything.
Am I posting too much?
Are people getting sick of hearing from me?
Do people think I’m showing off?
Am I talking about Jesus too much?
My notes from a recent call with my Media Strategist
For someone who had just written an entire book about his life, I suddenly became pretty afraid of being seen.
I confessed all of this to my media strategist, and she reminded me of something I had written about in my own dang book.
Going ALL IN.
What Sobriety Taught Me About Going All In
For years, I dabbled in faith.
I believed in God, but I wouldn't say I had completely surrendered my life to Him.
I even dabbled in sobriety.
There were times when I had surgeries and had to stop drinking for weeks before and after. I could do it when I had to. But as soon as I could drink again, I did.
I hadn't gone all in.
It wasn't until I was diagnosed with cirrhosis and had to face what alcohol was actually doing to me that something changed.
There wasn't an option to have one foot in and one foot out anymore.
So I went all in.
That decision changed my life.
And years later, I realized I was facing the same choice in a completely different way.
Sometimes You Need Someone to Remind You of Your Own Advice
As I sat there talking about all my fears around sharing the book, my media strategist basically told me:
“Curtis, you've already jumped in. There's no going back now. You either start swimming or you're going to drown.”
That hit me like a bolt of lightning.
I grabbed the notepad in front of me and wrote two words in big letters:
ALL IN.
Apparently, I needed someone to remind me of my own lesson.
Because writing the book wasn't the end of going all in.
It was the beginning.
Now I have to be willing to talk about it. To share what I believe. To tell the truth about what I've lived through.
And yes, sometimes I have to risk being too much for somebody.
You Don’t Have to Be for Everybody
I didn't write Something Only God Could Do for everybody.
I wrote it for the person who is on the edge of making a breakthrough in their life and is ready to put in the work.
Somebody who might be trying to quit drinking.
Somebody carrying things from childhood they've never dealt with but knows they should.
Somebody who thinks they've screwed up too badly to change but still has hope.
Somebody who desperately needs to know they're not alone.
If I'm so worried about annoying people that I stop talking to that person, then what was the point of writing the book in the first place?
That realization helped me understand something else.
Going All In Is a Decision You Make More Than Once
Maybe going all in isn't one big courageous decision you make once.
Maybe you have to keep making it.
Getting sober was going all in.
Deepening my faith was going all in.
Writing the book was going all in.
And now sharing my story—even when I feel exposed, even when somebody might roll their eyes, even when I wonder if I'm being too much—is another version of the same choice.
I already jumped.
Now I just have to keep swimming.
Fear Doesn’t Always Mean You’re Making the Wrong Decision
Maybe there's something you've already jumped into, too.
Recovery. A relationship. Your faith. A new career. A new life you're trying to build.
You made the decision. You took the first step.
And now you're standing there wondering whether you made a mistake because suddenly you're scared.
I've learned that fear doesn't necessarily mean you should turn around.
Sometimes fear shows up because what you're doing matters to you.
Sometimes self-doubt shows up after you've made the brave decision.
And sometimes going all in means continuing to move forward even when you don't feel particularly brave anymore.
Being scared doesn't always mean you're on the wrong path. Sometimes it just means you finally have something worth being brave for.
So if you're questioning yourself today, here's the reminder I needed too:
Keep swimming.
You've got this.
Are you ready to go all in?
In Something Only God Could Do, I share the story of my childhood, addiction, sobriety, faith, and what happened when I finally stopped running from the things I didn't want to face.
If you're at a point in your own life where you know something has to change, I wrote this book for you.