Allow me to quote a quote of a quote:

“He was a frail, sickly child, afraid of many things. So he stayed inside his house a lot and read books, mainly adventure stories. One day he was reading a novel by the English author Frederick Marryat. In his autobiography, Roosevelt records what happened:

‘In this passage the captain of some small British man-of-war is explaining to the hero how to acquire the quality of fearlessness. He says that at the outset almost every man is frightened when he goes into action, but that the course to follow is for the man to keep such a grip on himself that he can act just as if he was not frightened. After this is kept up long enough, it changes from pretense to reality, and the man does in very fact become fearless by sheer dint of practicing fearlessness when he does not feel it.’”

In context (The Art of War for Writers, to be precise), author J.S. Bell is talking about feigning fearlessness in the face of the daunting tasks of living a writing life, to act as if you are one until you become one. Author Steven Pressfield would call this manning your station, day-in, day-out, so that the Muse will find you hard at work and reward you as such.

And while this is helpful and true and beneficial advice, I read more into it.

The warring parts of my soul (some might even say the Jacob hovering above my right shoulder and the Lockeness Smoke Monster hovering over my left) answer the conundrum of feigning fearlessness differently.

Smokey answers: Your bad habits? The things you despise about yourself? The things you always want to change but you never seem to be able to shake them? You’ve been feigning godliness for a long time. Your pretense is not your reality. I know what’s real. You should just give up.

Jacob answers: I know what’s real. I can see behind the facade of your charades. I know your heart, your will. You have, actually, been feigning godliness for a long time, but that makes you just like all the others. And to see that you still try, despite the short hand you’ve been dealt? That you keep pressing on and pressing in and pressing forward impresses me. Don’t forget that. But don’t let it go to your head either.

And I answer: I used to be afraid, and because I was afraid I became numb. When the world changed and I was shocked back into feeling reality, I barely held on. I almost lost my grip, but I kept feigning fearlessness, and now that fearlessness… it’s almost real.