It wasn’t cos I couldn’t do it.

I did something last night that scares the absolute shit out of me.

I sang.

Which probably needs a little context, because I can sing. I'm not saying that in a weird, faux-modest oh I suppose I can hold a tune way. I've sung for years. I've won singing competitions. I've done musical theatre. There is plenty of evidence available to suggest that when I open my mouth, something reasonably pleasant is going to come out of it.

Still terrifies me.

Last night I went to a jam night. I sat and listened to everybody else for most of the evening, chatted to people, had a few beverages and was having a perfectly lovely time being a member of the audience.

And every so often, the little thought would appear.

You could get up.

Absolutely not.

Carry on with your drink.

Which is ridiculous when you think about it. I’ve spent years performing. Put me in front of a room to teach and I'm completely at home. Hand me a script, I deliver the shit out of it. Give me choreography to perform and I'll happily get on with it. But ask me to stand in front of a microphone and sing?

Apparently my nervous system has a completely separate filing system for that.

Eventually we got to the end of the night. Literally the last song.

And because we'd lost Dolly Parton this week, and because there are some opportunities that are apparently just strong enough to overpower the bit of my brain shouting DO NOT VOLUNTEER, I got up and sang 9 to 5.

And it was fab.

Everybody joined in. I loved it. Nothing terrible happened. Nobody evacuated the building. All the evidence I already had that I can, in fact, sing remained intact.

Afterwards, one of the lads came over and said:

“You sat there all night quiet, and then unleashed THAT voice!”

Which made me laugh.

But I've been thinking about it since.

We talk about confidence as though it's the natural reward for becoming competent at something. As though there's a neat little progression. You try something. You're nervous because you're new. You practise. You get better. Eventually you become good at it and, as your prize, you're handed confidence.

Except I'm not sure that's how it works.

Because I wasn't sitting there last night wondering whether I could sing. I knew I could sing. I've got decades of evidence.

I was still scared.

And I wonder whether we confuse confidence with comfort. We assume that if somebody is genuinely confident in their ability, doing the thing should feel easy. That eventually you reach some lovely level of competence where the nerves disappear and you just stride around doing things without your stomach ever trying to climb into your throat.

Maybe some people do.

Bastards.

For the rest of us, perhaps confidence looks slightly different.

Maybe confidence isn't the absence of fear.

Maybe it's simply not requiring the fear to disappear before you're allowed to do the thing.

I didn't conquer anything last night. I didn't give myself a motivational speech in the toilets. I didn't visualise success or step powerfully outside my comfort zone.

I had a couple of drinks, sat there quietly for most of the night, got scared, did it anyway and had a bloody lovely time.

And perhaps that's enough.

Because the interesting thing about the voice that bloke thought I'd been hiding all evening is that it hadn't gone anywhere.

It was there while I was scared too.