Yesterday afternoon I was in a meeting, and the ball got rollin with discussion about a question I got from a client about her fear of stepping out of her older sister's shadow... of taking action on what has evolved into her passion. She's young and wants to go into business and learn how to manage and run a growing organization with the dream one day of going into either politics or journalism. She also wants to lose over 50 pounds and keep it off for good because she wants to be taken seriously, and knows that she is seen as weak by many people. And it makes her feel weak, too, knowing that she hasn't been able to control her food urges and be super healthy. Wanting to be a leader of people, she said she knows that she must get in control over herself before she can lead others effectively. I told her that those are huge ambitions that would require total dedication, confidence and the ability to stare fear in the face and squash it... take its power away. Because there is very little in life that can stop you from doing things you truly want to do.
Big goals and dreams are just like small ones except that there are more steps, they take longer and when you get closer, the risks are higher. Because in life, when you want something very cool, you are probably competing with other people... they want the same thing you do. Or they just don't want you to succeed, and remind them of their mediocrity... how they aren't going after their dreams.
Dream stealers. These are people you want to stay away from. Every big goal you could have has its own risks. You can piss off family and friends who don't want you to change, grow, get new friends that aren't like them, and/or they don't want you to move away.Their wrath can come out in a lot of strange ways.The big thing is when you endure failures, or get slowed on your journey toward success (at anything), you will be criticized... sometimes mercilessly. Often this hammering can come from inside your own family...the exact people who are supposed to be on your side.You must push on. If you fall down or get derailed enough times on your path toward your dreams, your reputation can take many massive hits. And ooooooh, it can hurt. Make you want to quit.
Criticism can HURT. But it won't kill you. And it does not have to stop you. There can be other things to fear...Loss of money and security. Loss of physical health, in the form of injury or even the risk of death. But you can keep going in spite of the risks. Now, I've seen many people take stupid, unnecessary risks. I've taken my share of ill-advised gambles. But there are two ways of handling failures (mistakes, setbacks, errors, accidents, delays). They can either stop you, where the only thing you learn is that you are never going to reach your objective...OR, they can make you more determined, teaching you dozens of lessons that you use to win in the future. It's always our choice. Because if your life is the same now as it was 5 or 10years ago, it's fear that made it that way. If you are on the path to having a life, in 5 or 10 years, that looks about the same as it does right now, it's fear that will make it so. Because every day we are given choices. Most people can be pretty much whatever they make their mind up to be.
The average person has scary high potential. But the average person uses hardly any of it. Either you stare down fear, and go after your biggest dreams every single day, or you do little and end up with a meaningless life. Releasing the fears that are stamped on us when we are children is the key to unlocking your unlimited potential. Shrinking the lifelong fears that have kept you small, unimportant, unappreciated, underutilized, and way too often unwanted or unloved can be so easy. It's all in how you communicate with yourself. When you change the way you communicate with yourself, through your habitual, moment-by-moment mental pictures, your affirmations, the questions you are posing to yourself all through the day... when you make yours similar to the people who are now doing what you want to do, then your days will magically get better. Because doing what you need to do to make those dreams come true, in all areas of your life, mental and physical health, education, relationships, spiritual, career, financial, will become natural. Easy.
No comments:
Post a Comment