{"id":4080,"date":"2013-03-15T12:01:10","date_gmt":"2013-03-15T16:01:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/?p=4080"},"modified":"2013-02-09T18:47:16","modified_gmt":"2013-02-09T23:47:16","slug":"how-crazy-are-you","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/2013\/03\/how-crazy-are-you.html","title":{"rendered":"How Crazy Are You?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/files\/2013\/02\/wiggly-wires.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-4081\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/91\/2013\/02\/wiggly-wires-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" \/><\/a>When you think of the word crazy, it probably seems more like a negative adjective. Yet I think it can often be a positive trait to have, in moderation. When I was a DoorMat, I tried to be as un-crazy as possible. I wanted to just seem like a regular person and not stand out in any way that might attract a negative comment. Crazy was for other people.\u00a0 I just wanted to fit in. Looking back, I was kind of boring, afraid to do anything out of the norm, refusing to take risks and basically living in a little safety box.<\/p>\n<p>I felt safe but not happy. As I began to take baby steps out of DoorMatville, I also began to hear, \u201cAre you crazy?!\u201d when I took a few small risks. I heard it a lot when I decided to leave the security of marriage, without ever having taken care of myself. I\u2019d gone from the arms of my loving parents to a loving husband when I was twenty and had no idea of what I\u2019d do. When I burned my teaching license renewal form, accusations of being crazy escalated. As a teacher, I always had something to fall back on to support myself. But I\u2019d never wanted to be a teacher and only became one because I was told I \u201cshould.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>I knew it was time to fly and develop a life that I loved, not walk through life on auto-pilot as I&#8217;d been doing. So I laughed when asked if I was crazy and owned the label instead of defending myself. If it was crazy to want to be happy, then I\u2019d be crazy! Many people are scared to make moves or try new things or take risks and will put their fears and doubts onto you. I\u2019ve accepted that\u2019s their problem, not yours, unless you believe that you must be crazy and stop what you\u2019re doing.<\/p>\n<p>So many people are in ruts and just can\u2019t understand what you\u2019re doing when you try to break out of yours. It probably scares many people on some level since you\u2019re doing things they\u2019d love to do but can\u2019t imagine having the nerve to do. So they call you crazy, and other words that don\u2019t sound positive instead of using words that may fit you more, like daring, creative, adventurous, etc. For me now, crazy can mean all those words and more. And being a little \u201ccrazy\u201d can lead you to things you\u2019d enjoy or open up a wonderful world of possibilities.<\/p>\n<p>I was called crazy when I accepted the dare from my students years ago to rap and became the first white female rapper. I was considered even crazier when I started Revenge Records when people I paid to help me get a record deal ripped me off. All of this led me to the career I have today. So what I did might have seemed crazy to people with closed minds but it enabled me to have a career that makes me happy\u2014finally\u2014after a lot of years being an unhappy DoorMat.<\/p>\n<p>Think about how many great people were labeled crazy, before they proved themselves. Alexander Graham Bell set out to create a way to speak to people who were far away through wires\u2014how crazy was that! Christopher Columbus took off on a voyage to prove the world was round, when everyone believed it was flat\u2014a crazy man! And do you think the Wright brothers were considered sane when they prepared to fly in their first airplane? Often crazy is the prologue to brilliance, invention, success, innovation.<\/p>\n<p>Find your own crazy thing to do\u2014something you\u2019d love to do but some people wouldn\u2019t understand\u2014and do it. Try something new. Be crazy enough to take a risk. Plan a solo vacation, Learn how to speed skate or juggle or something completely out of your comfort zone. Look for a new job doing what you\u2019d love. Own yourself. Being a little crazy helps you to enjoy life more!<br \/>\n***************<\/p>\n<p>Join the <a href=\"http:\/\/howdoiloveme.com\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>Self-Love Movement\u2122<\/strong><\/a>! Take the <a href=\"http:\/\/howdoiloveme.com\/the-pledge\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>31 Days of Self-Love Commitment<\/strong><\/a> and get my book, <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/howdoiloveme.com\/the-book\" target=\"_blank\">How Do I Love Me? Let Me Count the Ways<\/a><\/strong> for free at <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/howdoiloveme.com\/\">http:\/\/howdoiloveme.com<\/a><\/strong>. Read my 2013 31 Days of Self-Love Posts <a href=\"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/2013\/02\/3961.html\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>HERE<\/strong><\/a>. Join the <a href=\"http:\/\/howdoiloveme.com\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>Self-Love Movement\u2122<\/strong><\/a>! on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/TheSelfLoveMovement\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>Facebook<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Please leave comments under my posts so we can stay connected.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>When you think of the word crazy, it probably seems more like a negative adjective. Yet I think it can often be a positive trait to have, in moderation. When I was a DoorMat, I tried to be as un-crazy as possible. I wanted to just seem like a regular person and not stand out&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":83,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,15],"tags":[88,124],"class_list":["post-4080","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-self-empowerment-confidence","category-self-love-acceptance","tag-self-empowerment","tag-taking-risks"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>How Crazy Are You? - Lessons from a Recovering Doormat<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/2013\/03\/how-crazy-are-you.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"How Crazy Are You? - Lessons from a Recovering Doormat\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"When you think of the word crazy, it probably seems more like a negative adjective. Yet I think it can often be a positive trait to have, in moderation. When I was a DoorMat, I tried to be as un-crazy as possible. I wanted to just seem like a regular person and not stand out&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/2013\/03\/how-crazy-are-you.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Lessons from a Recovering Doormat\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2013-03-15T16:01:10+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2013-02-09T23:47:16+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/files\/2013\/02\/wiggly-wires-300x200.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Daylle Deanna Schwartz\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"How Crazy Are You? - Lessons from a Recovering Doormat","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/2013\/03\/how-crazy-are-you.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"How Crazy Are You? - Lessons from a Recovering Doormat","og_description":"When you think of the word crazy, it probably seems more like a negative adjective. 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Let Me Count the Ways, a She's appeared on hundreds of TV and radio shows, including Oprah, Howard Stern, and Good Morning America and has been quoted in dozens of publications, including the New York Times, Chicago Sun-Times, Cosmopolitan, Redbook, Marie Claire, and Men\u00b9s Health. After being a consummate People Pleaser who felt unworthy of getting her own needs met for many years, Daylle found a path of self-love that enabled her to build her self-esteem and reinvent herself into a dual career. She learned to get taken seriously without being overtly assertive when she became one of the first women to start an independent record label (on a dare!) and learned to play ball nicely and successfully in an industry dominated by men. To help independent musicians empower themselves, Daylle writes music business books for Billboard\/Random House, including the very popular Start &amp; Run Your Own Record Labe and I Don't Need a Record Deal! Daylle's books have been translated into over 10 languages and are popular around the world. She speaks for colleges, organizations and corporations. Through her company, Project Self-Empowerment, Daylle creates programs and materials to help people empower themselves. One goal is to raise the money to self-publish her book, How Do I Love Me? Let Me Count the Ways and give it away for free in colleges and through organizations, to give thanks for all her blessings. Daylle uses her writing and speaking to help others find the kind of contentment and empowerment that she has.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/author\/dschwartz"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4080","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/83"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4080"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4080\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4083,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4080\/revisions\/4083"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4080"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4080"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4080"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}