My Year of Hopefulness - Stage Fright

Today, the theatre group joined, Temporary Shakespeare Company, had its first performance. We did a reading of Comedy of Errors for corporate employees at my company. All morning, I was reminded of how it felt to be on stage and why I didn't pursue that avenue. I have horrible, horrible stage fright. Always. Without fail. 

Today, the stakes were even higher because I played a sorceress in front of people I work with, obviously in a very different capacity. Somehow, standing on that stage with all these other people taking the same risk made my stage fright dissipate. I didn't shake, I didn't feel sick to my stomach. We jumped off the cliff together. And the audience, our co-workers, caught us. 

And maybe that's all it takes to make us let go of our fear, whether on stage or off: a group of people willing to let go of their fear, too.