Monday night I just happened to catch the last episode of this season’s “Halloween Baking Championship”—you know, the one where they have the final four bakers and one of them wins $25,000 and a feature in Food Network Magazine while everyone else goes home empty-handed? I’m normally playing catch-up with reruns, but this time I had a front row seat for the finale.
The last challenge was to create a dessert that reflected their “most feared demise”. The options included drowning, being eaten by a bug, being skinned alive, or being crushed. None of which sound appealing and a few of which are downright disgusting. Which I’m pretty sure was the whole point.
As though Fate was waiting in the wings with his hand outstretched toward her, Melanie Bjork-Jensen was assigned being crushed to death. Throughout the competition she had struggled with feelings of inadequacy. She suffered from imposter syndrome, believing the powers that be would quickly realize she had no business competing and would send her home, even though she was already operating a successful business. Learning how to make wedding cakes by watching YouTube videos, Melanie eventually began her home bakery as a way to pay for nurse’s school after a brutal divorce, and as a means to help provide for her two children. And now . . . now she had to take her worst fear and use it as inspiration.
In her own words, “My inner voices are not nice to me, and it’s been that way since I was a little kid. Mental health is a thing.” She even had the words “I’m worth the effort it takes to be happy” tattooed on her arm to help her remember, but she was still filled with self-doubt. Her fear wasn’t of being physically crushed. It was a fear of the mental and emotional weight she had carried for years.
Her winning dessert? A peanut butter and chocolate cake, Victorian in appearance, iced beautifully in black. And across its top were written the soul-crushing words that had echoed in her head for far too long.
“You are not enough.”
She had suffered from brain cancer, all the while firmly believing she deserved it. She had been through a difficult divorce, all the while firmly believing she deserved it. No matter what trial Life threw her way, Melanie believed she deserved the suffering that accompanied it. But she still persevered.
Fear is a powerful weapon—it can fill us with self-doubt, making us believe we don’t deserve anything good that comes our way . . . convincing us we deserve the trials and tribulations . . . that we shouldn’t even try because our efforts will only end in failure. But Melanie’s story had a happy ending—or at least a happy middle. She somehow managed to quiet the voices that constantly told her she was not worthy. Not to silence them, but to reduce their volume. And she walked away a winner. She took her worst fear and used it for good. And did it on national television where everyone could see her struggles and her triumphs.
I guess I’ve taken the scenic route to say we all have hopes and dreams and we all have fears and self-doubts. It’s hard to pursue the first two when the latter two are holding you back. So, if you do have a dream . . . something you hope to turn into a reality . . . don’t wait. Don’t let fear and self-doubt weigh you down. Too many dreams die with the dreamers. Please, don’t let that happen to yours.
About the author: Lisa Shackelford Thomas is a fourth-generation member of a family that’s been in funeral service since 1926 and has worked with Shackelford Funeral Directors in Savannah, Tennessee for over 45 years. Any opinions expressed here are hers and hers alone and may or may not reflect the opinions of other Shackelford family members or staff.
