What’s Your Darkest Fear?
It’s not an easy question to answer. In trying to find tips on writing a story, someone suggested I look at tips posted by Chris Oatley (a concept artist for Disney). One point it brought up is that fear is universal, and that you should confront your own darkest fear. In Toy Story, for example, Woody’s darkest fear was being forgotten and replaced. It got me thinking about my own, and in thinking about the answer, some emotions came out.
My simple answer to the question is, my darkest fear is that I’ll never fulfill my dreams. And my main dreams are: to have a place of my own, and to have a career that makes me happy.
Here’s the dilemma: I’d love to lock myself in my room and focus on what I need to do in order to get a career, but there’s a handful of kids that need to be cared for that live here too (foster kids, baby sister, nephew…). Every time I run off to my room to work on my art, I feel so guilty for not helping out. At the same time, every time I help out I feel frustrated for not being able to work on my art. It would be great if I can do both, or devote half the day to each one, but this house has kids here all day long.
I guess I could say that part of my darkest fear is also that I’d spend my life making everyone, but myself, happy. Sounds a bit pathetic, I know, but I’ve always been empathetic and it keeps me from being completely detached and only worrying about what I want.
How about you? What’s your darkest fear? No judgements here; only support.
Side note: If you want to read the article that this question came from, here’s a link to it: https://chrisoatley.com/writing-timeless-stories-toy-story/#more-131543
