“The key to change… is to let go of fear.”
Every successful person has had to deal with fear at some point in their lives. That old adage that “the road to hell is paved with good intentions” may be true, but it is also true that the road to success is littered with fear and uncertainty. Often the biggest difference between someone that is wildly successful and someone who is not is the courage to take significant action over and over again.
What do you need to do to take that significant action, repeatedly?
1. First, simply decide to succeed. Most people never really decide to do or accomplish anything significant. The best they offer life is that they will ‘kinda sorta try it out.’ But, once you have truly decided to go for your dreams, there is no other option. There is no longer room for fear or doubt in your mind. In fact, the word ‘decide’ means to cut yourself off from any and every other possibility.
2. Embrace risk. Chase after your fears and show them who is boss. Make those tough presentation. Take on those scary phone call. Ask for whatever it is that you want. A big part of being successful is doing things that other people are often too afraid to do.
3. Prepare yourself. Many of life’s stresses, challenges, and concerns are things that we spend time anticipating. They are not always surprises. Take the time and initiative to be pro-active. Look for solutions and put them into place before you need them. When you can see a challenge that is likely to come up, simply prepare for it instead of worrying about it. The energy is the same. Spend time getting ready, or spend time worrying.
4. Go with the flow. If you don’t live in the past or future, life can become much less stressful. Let go of your resistance to the present moment and just see what develops.
5. Focus on the good outcomes. Most people spend their time and energy looking for the worst that can happen, and then expecting it. Change things up. Expect the best and it becomes much much easier to take action. Sure, some undesirable and unexpected things will likely happen along the way, but they will not have a detrimental impact because of #3 and #4.
6. Learn to relax. When you feel stress and anxiety building up, taking a few slow, deep breaths can make a huge difference. To a large extent, our psychology (our mind) follows our physiology (our body). Breathing is the only part of our physiology that we can easily control. Learn to use that control to your advantage.
7. Fully engage in your life and get away from the news. The news is so negative. Instead of being chained to you TV set, find something interesting to do with your time. Take some piano or guitar lessons, go hiking, or go skydiving. It will make your life more interesting, too.
8. Realize that you are enough. Even if you have things to learn and skills that need to be honed, that doesn’t’t mean that you are incapable of the tasks at hand. Plan to acquire the resources and learn the skill you need, but do everything you can with the resources you already have available to you now.
9. Start small. Make a list of everything that you need to do but cannot seem to follow through on. Put them in order from least scary to most. Now decide to do the item at the top of the list. When that’s done, do the next. Only focus on the current item at the top of the list.
10. Get professional help. If you find that your fears have paralyzed you and you cannot see a clear way forward, get some help from a professional. Sometimes just talking about the situations release a few of the shackles. Plus, they can supply you with more exercises than I have here.
The only way to truly be free is to conquer your fears. The only way to conquer your fears is to do the things that frighten you. Show yourself that you can do those things successfully. Start your journey from fear to freedom today!
Thoughts?
photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/hoyvinmayvin/4645589244/sizes/z/in/photostream/
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