The Big Question

Blog warning! Having a bouncing baby blog tempts one to become self-indulgent and maudlin.
Back on February 2, when I said I'd been figuring out an issue, and wondered if my digging into it might benefit others as well, I had no intention of rambling on for weeks about it!
Here's the point: Because of a leak in my memory chamber, or something, I never know when I'm going to forget something important, thus causing me to either let someone down, or fail at something in a spectacular and painful way. The crutches I figured out for myself are two (a good and useful number for crutches).
1. I must write everything, and I do mean everything, down.
2. I must look at my lists constantly, all day long. This means that during particularly high-event or high-stress or low energy times in my life, all of which happen regularly, I actually wear a tiny notebook and pen fastened to my clothing. I call it my External Memory.
Today, my life is under better control, and I can usually remember most things. I am always excited and proud when I remember something without checking my list, or even without writing it down - a dangerous risk to take, still.
So the background anxiety with which I live is a little lower in intensity, but I still have to worry all the time about whether I am succeeding, or forgetting, or . . . well, basically, pleasing ALL OF THE PEOPLE ALL OF THE TIME! (A separate, but related problem, I know. . .)
Thus the unusual fear of criticism. Here's the question, and it's a serious one, a question I have to face repeatedly:
Am I, in fact, capable of achieving a useful life? Of using to their fullest the cluster of gifts God has given me? Of exercising the deep compassion that my past has engendered in me for faulty humans? Or should I go back in the cave, because my best efforts may really hurt people?
Not to mention hurting me!
Each time I go through this soul-searching it's a little clearer to me, and this is the clearest it's been, so this blog has been of use to me, at least, if not to anyone else. But I'm still not entirely sure of the answer.
I can't quite quit, so I never quite do. . . I go back in the cave and cry and lick my wounds for awhile. Then I obsess and make myself sick over how to make everything perfect the next time. Oh, and by the way, the particular episode of criticism with which this particular episode of soul-searching began? It was, in fact, unjust. I did not fail, except in the sense of not meeting someone's expectations, always very painful to me, but I cannot and never will meet everyone's expectations. That doesn't seem to stop me from obsessing.
Well, enough of that. I think I'll just leave the question. I have to re-answer for myself daily, and I suppose you do, too. For now, I'll get up and take one more step.
Next week, an entirely new, and infinitely more interesting subject!

Repairing the Breach,
Debbonnaire