Building a business while fighting your fears is no picnic.
Fear of failure, fear of success, fear of making the wrong decision, fear of having people follow what you do, fear that people won’t follow what you do.
Holy moly, who’d want to have a picnic with those guys around?
Left to their own devices, those fears will hinder your ability to build the successful, profitable business that you want. But when you build enough self-confidence, you’ll be more than a match for any fear or challenge you’re faced with.
That’s how your business will grow, and here’s how it works.
1. You’ll go the extra mile
How do you get to Carnegie Hall? By having the strength to keep going when it’s easier to give up.
OK, practice is important too (and a funnier line).
Most people get 90% through a project and then either finish it or quit. By that point it’s probably “pretty much there� and “not bad at all.�
Sometimes it’s appropriate to go ahead and “shipâ€? at that 90% point. But not if you want to create something extraordinary. And extraordinary sells — it’s the last 10% where the magic happens.
The last 10% of the most worthwhile endeavors is where you need to dig deep and find the spark and the faith to keep you going. This requires a deep-rooted trust that you can do it. It requires that your confidence in your capability is greater than the challenge ahead.
Going the extra mile when others might give up is what separates good from great.
2. You’ll do what matters
Recognize any of these?
- I can’t do that because they won’t like it
- This kind of problem is always nasty to deal with
- I’m expected to be ultra-smart
- I have to do it this way because that’s how it’s always done
- I have to be professional
This is just a tiny sample of some rules that you may have set for yourself.
Whether you recognize these examples or not, you’re sure to have a bunch of expectations about what you can and can’t do, should and shouldn’t do, must and mustn’t do.
Added to that, you have expectations about what other people can and can’t do, should and shouldn’t do, must and mustn’t do.
And most brain-numbingly complicated of all, you have expectations about what other people expect of you.
True success comes from engaging with the things that matter to you and taking continued, meaningful action. But that’s only possible if you sweep aside the rules and expectations that don’t serve you.
Set aside the rules that don’t make sense, and make a firm decision to engage with something that has personal meaning — on your own terms.
3. You’ll make better connections
It’s not easy meeting people and building relationships, and it’s relationships that build a great business.
Until you calm your relationship-building demons and give yourself room to do it in ways that work for you (and your business), you’ll continue to struggle.
You’ll draw back from reaching out to people because you’re scared of being judged or rejected. Or you’ll second-guess yourself. Or step into a role that doesn’t fit, and end up with a performance that just isn’t convincing.
Natural confidence means that you don’t need to worry about approval or how you’re coming across. You’ll be able to connect naturally using the best of yourself … not in a big, shouty, look-at-me kind of way, but in a way that honors who you are and what you can do.
4. You’ll scare yourself
When that voice of fear or doubt rises inside you and tells you that your plan is too risky, what do you do?
The vast majority do exactly what that voice tells them to do: Nothing.
Most people choose safety and comfort over risk and discomfort. But that’s not where you’ll do your best work.
Your best work requires that you have to step beyond the confines of what you know, what you’ve done, and even who you know yourself to be. Sometimes you have to scare yourself silly in order to play a bigger game and participate in something amazing.
Of course you’ll be scared. Without inventing the flux capacitor and going into the future, you don’t know how things will work out. Uncertainty always creates some fear.
But natural confidence gives you the ability to trust yourself. Even though you might be trembling in your boots, you can step into the unknown with a deep trust that you can deal with whatever happens — good or bad.
It’s pretty cool.
5. You’ll be able to say no
Have you ever said “Yes� to something because it’s easier than rocking the boat by saying “No�?
Because you wanted to keep someone happy?
Because you thought it was expected of you?
I know I have. I bet you have, too.
But there’s only so much of you to go around, and everything you spend time on is time that you’re not spending somewhere else. For everything you say “Yes� to, you’re saying “No� to something else, and in your business this equation is critical.
I’m not suggesting you turn into a selfish jerk. Generosity is a rare commodity, and something to be encouraged. But only if it’s in the right spirit.
Saying “Yes� to stay out of a conflict, to please the other guy, or to receive validation is the wrong spirit.
Self-confidence means that your value doesn’t depend on how much other people approve of you.
It means you can make deliberate, enlightened decisions about what you do and where you spend your time, based on your priorities and values instead of your insecurities.
6. You won’t be fixated on success
It’s natural to want to succeed in what you’re doing. Otherwise you wouldn’t be here. But what if that focus on “successâ€? was actually hindering you rather than helping?
See, success is the wrong motivator. It’s often based on extrinsic factors, the things you think success can deliver.
For you, it might be the feeling that you’ve “made it.� Maybe it’s the absence of worry. Maybe it’s respect and admiration. Or maybe it’s being able to travel first class, buy that shiny car, or eat at the best restaurants.
If you know what real success means for you, that’s great, but you’re in the minority.
Many chase an idea of success that they’ve patched together from what they’ve read, observed, or think they should be aiming for.
If you go after a muddled construct of success and place your self-worth on achieving it — â€?If only I can get there, everything will be so much betterâ€? — you’re setting things up to be a struggle. And you’ll only feel disappointed and disconnected when (and if) you get there.
The fact is that success comes and goes just like failure does. So shouldn’t your self-worth depend not on the outcome, but on the way you play the game?
Instead of chasing success, take continued, meaningful action. Two things will happen. You’ll vastly increase the chances of experiencing real success in your business, and you also make sure it feels great when you get there.
7. You’ll always be ready to make the next decision
Building any business requires a constant stream of decisions. Sometimes those decisions will work out and sometimes they won’t.
Ask the world’s leading entrepreneurs and business leaders. They’ll tell you that failing is as important as succeeding in building anything worthwhile.
Without self-confidence, it’s easy to take screw-ups personally and to let them affect your thinking.
But the fact is that screw-ups are only a big deal if you decide they are. A great business is one that engages with the decisions it needs to make.
If you trust yourself to make decisions, then you don’t need to retreat, beat yourself up, or reinforce a negative self-image if something doesn’t work out. You’re always ready to make the next decision, no matter how this one turns out.
Reader Comments (68)
Being self-confident is the stepping stone to greatness. If you read classical self help books, like Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill, or How To Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie – guess what? You have to believe that you can do what you set out to accomplish. You blog post outlines the key stepping stones to building up that confidence.
Like it a lot – as an internet marketer and as someone who has a massive professional Thaiboxing fight in 2 weeks.
Number 4 resonated because it’s that pushing through discomfort that puts you somewhere you’ll look back and think “Wow – i did that!”
One sentence that resonates with me deeply from this article:
“Instead of chasing success, take continued, meaningful action.”
Thank you for your insights.
Dude! I love point #6! Once every ten years, there’s an opportunity to quote Rush lyrics, and that time is now:
Living in the limelight, the universal dream
For those who wish to seem.
Those who wish to BE
must put aside the alienation,
get on with the fascination,
the real relation,
the underlying dream.
[Can I get a Bic-lighter “Woooooooooooo!”]
Don’t have a lighter, but I’ll second the bas-ass-ness of Rush (especially their Live in Rio video). I’m waiting for Brian to write a post about them one day.
You have to believe you are great (mentally) before you can trust yourself to go out & do something great!
Does that make sense?
Being confident helps in any area, not just blogging. I think you have to have a thick skin and not be afraid of failing in order to build confidence. As long as you keep doing things, posting, commenting, etc… I think one’s confidence will continue to grow in their abilities.
Exactly, business and entrepreneurship is all about risk-taking. That means not everything you plan for will work out. It’s important, however, to feel capable and to have self-efficacy even in the face of uncertainty.
I just published an interview with Peter Shallard, “The Shrink for Entrepreneurs” and he talks about how fear is the last obstacle between you and your business success. I recommend people check it out.
These are great tips, another one would be to know where you are going. If you know where your going, you have goals, you are setting out to achieve them. You will be confident in your decisions and actions because you know it is taking you closer to achieving these goals that you set for yourself and your business.
Hey, Steve!
I’ll tell you what.. your message fits right in with the other things I’ve been reading and hearing over the past week or so. That was when I reminded myself WHY I want to do what I’m working on. That, in turn, allowed me to clarify my OWN definitions of success and failure. Doing that has given me the confidence to move forward, knowing what it’s important to say YES to, and let everything else go.
It’s an incredible thing to find positive signs that I’m on the right track day after day. The Universe supports us when we finally say YES!
Annie
I really like this article. Being a start-up I have come to realize that people don’t want to know this when doing business with you. They also don’t want to know how you became a start-up especially when just four months prior you had an 8 year old business.
We need to understand that mistakes can be made in business. You can over think and you can just think – but not all decisions will be good ones. As much as we would like to succeed quickly and visibly I agree with you. I know define my own success based on what I would like the outcome to be for any project that unGeeked is undertaking.
And I’ve learned some lessons. Even with thorough thought and research, my decisions will not always take me where I want to go. But the worst mistake I can make is not learning from my decisions. And in order to learn from them. I first need to admit them.
Great post.
Yes! Definitely!
Once we break thru the first layer of fear (in fact it’s VERY thin ;))… The true creation power will flow immensely into you nonstop!
More and more new cool business ideas are born, in just few hours! And you’ll start to *feel* money-making happy feeling inside you!
Really, just take the FIRST step. Forget about how people will look at you if you don’t perform well. Often time, you’ll get incredible good comments from your first step!
And you’ll never look back – because you’ll be flying! 🙂
“3. You’ll make better connections”
This is very true. Confidence goes miles. I’ve made a lot of new contacts just by following this principle.
These kinds of insights are, I’ve found, really foundational for people who want to start (or successfully run) businesses. If you can’t get your confidence mojo in place, it’s terribly hard to make anything work properly.
I really like numbers one and three.
Number one talks about going the extra mile. My first blog post was about the same thing — why your product needs to be awesome. People buy products that are great. Not because they think you are nice or want to make you happy. They buy because the product is killer. Genesis, Thesis, and Scribe are killer. People don’t buy based on charity. So whether your product is a service or an actually product, it needs to be killer.
Number three mentions the importance of relationships. I’m learning that relationships in business are critical. Knowing the right people at the right time can be the difference between success and no success. How do you know who you will need to know when? You don’t. So get to work meeting everyone you can now. You never know how you can help them and they can help you in the future. But it starts right now.
I really like this:
‘Many chase an idea of success that they’ve patched together from what they’ve read, observed, or think they should be aiming for.’
This is something that so many businesses don’t even consider. Almost all just follow the ‘growth’ – ‘more money’ route. Have you read ‘Let My People Go Surfing?’
“I can’t do that because they won’t like it”
I fight this all the time. I feel like my blog is a bit bland, because I hold back a bit on my true feelings about some things. Why? I’m afraid of rocking the boat and upsetting the people who follow me.
Really, I need to stop that.
Confidence = cashflow.
You can ride boldness straight to the bank.
I was walking home from the gym this morning and was thinking about this very thing! I was actually listening to a song on my iPhone and thought of a post idea along these lines.
In my opinion this is the BIGGEST mistake entrepreneurs make in their businesses! You hit the nail on the head Steve, great stuff.
self-confidence: “belief in oneself and one’s powers or abilities”!
Without this nothing is possible, especially in an era (Information Age) where you being a thought leader is crucial to your niche and the success of your endeavors. WOW!
Imagine doing any job without confidence… Now imagine how long you will keep it if you don’t become confident. Same rules apply in your own business, except you may not get more than 1 chance with your customers.
There are no labor laws that govern how your viewing public is supposed to treat you and give you chances!
Great Post! Now, everyone, get your swagger on and get to work!
This is a GREAT post – Funny, by title, it seems so obvious – but just a quick read… actually gives a great boost!
Thanks for sharing ~
🙂
I could not agree more! I’ve watched a lot of folks, including my clients, run businesses.
Those who put off decisions because they might be wrong wind up with a pile of unmade decisions on their desk.
And that’s a bad thing!
Because not making a decision is, of course, making a decision!
Number 4 reminds me of one of my favorite quotes by Amelia Earhart, “Who wants to live a life imprisoned in safety?”
Just what I needed to hear today! Chalk another one up for confidence. What can’t it do?
Thanks for the great advice! There is definitely a different perspective when you have enough respect for yourself to admit that your time is valuable and understand that the better answer is sometimes “no”. So good to remember that is DOES mean a sacrifice of something else every time you commit. Thanks!
Confidence is extremely important in cold calling. You stand to acquire plenty of business by making calls, but if you don’t come across confident then no one’s going to take you seriously. Good post!
@Randy: “Stepping stone to greatness” – I like that 🙂 To be honest, I haven’t read either of those titles. I think it’s because I learn best by making my own mistakes (which is also how I keep my confidence intact).
@Allen: A massive professional Thaiboxing fight? That’s enough to scare the bejeezus out of me and I bruise like a peach. I’m always super-impressed when I meet people who do things like this that I can’t concieve of!
@Leyla: That’s the nail on the head, you’re very welcome.
@Andrew: Yay, I coincided with the ten year cycle! Thanks for the light show.
@Carolee: It does make sense, but to be honest I think you can go out and do something great even if you have doubts over what might happen. True confidence isn’t about being 100% confident, it’s about being willing to take meaningful action even if you’re shaking in your boots.
@Richard: Darn straight and very well said. Thanks for the comment Richard.
@Steven: I need to do some work with Mr Shallard me thinks. He’s doing some great stuff out there.
@Matt: Goals can be useful tools for making progress, for sure, but they can often cause more problems than they solve. The important thing is for the game you’re playing and the goals that make you a great player fit with something that has meaning and relevance to you.
@Annie: Good for you – sounds like you’ve had a cracking week! Go to it and let us know how it all goes!
@thatwoman_is: Thanks for the insightful comment. People can get lost in research and planning, and can make decisions to postpone decisions or go down different roads out of fear. The key is to be willing to *do something*.
@Yin Li: Someone wise wonce said that a path is formed by laying one stone at a time – thanks for the comment!
@Jonah: It’s one of the most overlooked parts of business (except for here on CopyBlogger obviously) but is just priceless. Glad to meet you Jonah.
@Sonia: Confidence mojo – I might have to use that somewhere 😉
@Joseph: Thanks Joseph. I never used to like going to networking events because they all seemed so stuffy, until someone said to me that networking is what you do whenever you’re in a place with other people. It’s all about connection.
@Tom: One man business and global enterprises can fall into that trap – I’m always surprised at how often I see it. I haven’t read that and I’ll go check it out – thanks for the tip.
@Kelly: Sometimes rocking the boat is needed, and other times there’s nothing wrong with a little diplomacy. You may well find that people connect with you stronger as they find out what makes you tick and what fires you up. Not everyone will agree with you, but wouldn’t that be dull?
@Garin: I know some good designers – I might get them to draw a visual of someone riding boldness to the bank. Love that, thanks!
@Andrew: So glad you get it Andrew! I agree, it’s the biggest mistake and biggest gap I see when people are striving for success – they’re starting in the wrong place.
@Sharon: You’re very welcome 🙂
@Joseph: Who wants a pile of unmade decisions on their desk? I like they idea that they pile up like that – and I really think they do occupy some space in terms of the impact on self-esteem and self-confidence.
@Christy: Gah, the idea is just horrible isn’t it? It’s like the great Thoreua quotation – “The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation”
@Jeff: “What can’t it do?” – that’s a great idea for a post! The Yes/No equation is a critical one in every part of life, and something that I encourage people to make a deliberate chocie over. Thanks for stopping by Jeff.
Your post reminds me of a parody I just read of the chasing-success-for-its-own-sake phenomenon: “How I Became a Famous Novelist” by Steve Hely. It’s about a writer who decides to write a best-selling novel purely to humiliate his ex-girlfriend at her wedding. Hilarious!
Re: “A great business is one that engages with the decisions it needs to make.”
Well said! In the end, every solution has a problem. Having the confidence to deal with those problems and make decisions is going to propel you forward. There’s no sense in worrying or stressing about a situation because that creates more and more self-doubt and that’s more crippling than anything else.
I think that we naturally self-impose obstacles on ourselves in both business and our personal lives and that all stems from a lack of confidence.
So, cheer up, know that everything has a solution, muster up that confidence and kick *ss!
Steve,
I like the idea of not chasing success, follow what you love and provide value and success will follow you. Good tips.
Being confident is critical, methinks…if YOU don’t believe in yourself, why on earth should others?
I don’t quite get the connection between trusting your own decisions and not beating yourself up when things go wrong. I agree with not beating yourself up when you make a mistake, but that goes more along with seeing your self-worth as being independent from your business. I don’t see the connection between that and having faith in your ability to make decisions (I need a few more dots.)
Otherwise great article! I just think it’s more about self-worth than it is about self-confidence; those concepts are related but are not quite the same thing.
Hi Steve,
I enjoyed reading all the 7 points in your post.
I will always remember this sentence out of what you wrote which is very useful and important:
“Instead of chasing success, take continued, meaningful action.”
I’ll check out your blog to see what else you are up to.
Vance
I don’t aim for success. I simply want to be happy.
Whatever you call it, happiness, succcess, emotional health it is all the same – perpetual choice between Love & Fear.
Even though Copyblogger helps me, well it is sad to admit, more than my friends and family, this article was one of the most powerful of all.
I am a rather skeptical person but I will print this in a couple of minutes and put it in my closest reach. Thank you
being ready inside is more important ,as everyone said,than being ready financially or what ever , you just have to make all what you said in your list in addition , the strong well and the good personality do matter really , specially if you are a serious and motivated person ,evrything about it will be the best combination ever !! very good remarks ! 😉
I love copyblogger. I find this is some of the best advice anywhere, and applies to life, not just blogs. So sensible!
I usually share it with my artist online community too.
Totally agree. Be determined: Practice makes perfect.
This sentence stands out: “Sometimes you have to scare yourself silly in order to play a bigger game and participate in something amazing.” I can relate. This article is totally relevant to my current endeavors.
Being confident sometimes means everything. However, how can one be confident if one hasn’t had the taste of success? How can an individual know that success is eventual? I am a blogger myself and I have been blogging for a few months now and I have confidence, but sometimes I lose it. Few months have passed and I am only getting a few people a day on my blog. How does confidence help me in this case? Maybe successful blogs or successful individuals have secrets that they don’t share with anybody. What I am trying to say is that confidence or no confidence, an individual needs persistence and professionalism when it comes to business.
Awesome post! Confidence can make or break the deal for sure
Thanks! This is helping me pick myself up and move forward again.
Great article! I really love the first point. It’s easy to be excited about a project in the beginning, but to have the staying power to see your vision through to the end takes some really hard work and makes you dig down deep. The feeling of completing that last 10% is extremely rewarding and knowing that you did the best job possible.
without confidence it is indeed difficult to make money. But is it always true that you cant make money without being confident? When i entered the small business I was in, I was never confident. I feared I might fail. I feared that I might be the luaghing stock of my relatives. However, the thought of entrepreneurship, the thought of owning a business, the thouht of doing something which I luiked was which guided me.
So in my opinion confidence is not an absolute necessaity although it can help you a lot in your endeavour.
I’ve seen some amazingly non-confident people find success, but it was either a) terribly limited when you looked at their abilities, or b) something they could never manage to enjoy.
That’s been my experience, anyway.
That might be true. I have seen some cases like that too. However the change that happened to me was I GREW confident rather than starting with confidence. I am pretty sure than any entrepreneur, even though they may be daring to the core, might be fearful of failure at some point of time. They might have felt the slightest feeling of not being confident. So confidence and money sure grows in hand. I really appreciate this post because copyblogger seems to bring out the natural facts as opposed to the theories people write on blogs.
I agree, and would like to make a distinction. Confidence is not the absence of fear, it’s being able to make decisions in line with what matters to you and TRUST those decisions, no matter how scared you are.
I still feel un-confident in some endeavours, typically those that I haven’t done before. Does that mean that I’m not confident? No, it just means that I have to trust my behaviour and keep making decisions. Make sense?
Failure, no such thing. Just experiences. Every time one of your business ideas flopped just look at what you have learned and carry on as a more stronger and experienced business person. From selling DVDs on ebay and amazon to my money making blogs all failed to make any significant income but with all i have learned from those now i make a full time living online. NEVER GIVE UP.
@Chris: Exactly, people can always pick up on whether you believe in what you’re saying or have trust in the offer you’re making.
@Laurie: I’ll look that up, thanks Laurie!
@Ricardo: I like that – “Every solution has a problem”. Go kick ass Ricardo, holler if I can help out.
@Mike: Thanks fella, appreciate the comment.
@Barbara: Exactly. Always good to see you!
@MaLinda: I see confidence as being able to choose your behaviour with implicit trust in that behaviour. That’s different from trusting the outcome. If you can have implicit trust in your ability to choose your behaviour then you’re always ready to make a great choice and it simply doesn’t matter if you screw up. Your self-worth is based on engaging with what matters to you, not the outcome of that effort.
@Vance: Stop by whenever you want Vance, good to have you.
@Jef: Happy is kind of subjective and can be really complex. The trick is to simplify it, don’t you think?
@Marina: Yeah, people will call it different things and see it in different ways, and that’s all good. What matters is knowing what it is for you. Thanks so much for the feedback, much appreciated.
@Rahul: “Being ready inside” – love that. Thanks!
@Docpixel: I wouldn’t go that far (!), but thanks for the feedback.
@Dawn: Go to it Dawn!
@Will: Sounds like you’re up against it Will, let us know how it goes and holler if I can help out.
@Sam: Truth is, you don’t know is success is eventual, which is precisely why you don’t need to wait for it or be overly attached to it. To be honest, sometimes we all lose confidence, me included. The trick, I believe, is to remember what’s important to you and keep on plugging into those things. Whether that effort pays off in terms of business success is dependent on many, many factors, and sometimes you have to make hard decisions.
You’re right, business (and life) does need persistence. but how do you keep persisting when you get demotivated and disillusioned? By trusting yourself to keep on playing and trusting yourself to make the next decision. That IS confidence.
@Ahmed: It’s a killer ingredient for sure!
@PEBS: Keep on making decisions, and trusting yourself to do the next thing. Holler if I can help out.
@Pipes: And sometimes the only person who needs you to get into that last 10% is you, right? Knowing that you played the game to your best ability is worth its weight in gold.
I read awhile ago that “success is a moving target.” I like that and it helps me to focus not so much on some specific goal that may, or not, ultimately bring me fulfillment.
This kind of flies in the face of a lot of conventional wisdom – the kind that you will actually read on a lot of blogs like this one – that we have to have all these really specific goals about what we want to do and where we want to go or we will never be “successful.”
But if success is a moving target (and I think it is) and if life is always in flux (I know mine is) I think it is much better to have some general goals that can be easily adjusted with what is (or is not) working with my life. It comes down to priorities for me. My family comes before my blog/business. That doesn’t mean I am not putting a lot of work and thought and sweat (figuratively speaking!) into what I am building, but it does mean I am not going to beat myself up if it takes a little longer because someone (like my 8-year old) needs me.
Have you been reading Seth Godin at all? This is very Godin-esque, and he is a genius in my book (so to speak)
Great post 🙂
Confidence is something we all need to have to reach our goals in life. If we lack confidence there is no way we can make it BIG in life.
@Safa: Sometimes giving up is exactly the right thing to do, but like picking yourself up after an idea flops, you gotta do it as a positive choice. Sounds like you’ve learned a heap from your business – love it.
@Anne: Anne, you rock. I share your views on goals, and contraversially as a coach I don’t use goal-setting and have been quite vocal about the problems they cause on my blog and other sites. That’s why I talk about “playing a game that matters”, because it makes room for that flux while still getting you engaging with something amazing and playing to your best ability. Sounds like you’ve got it nailed 🙂
@AC: Wow, that’s the first time something I’ve written has been compared to Godin. I’m assuming that’s a good thing, because (and I probably shouldn’t admit this in public considering the following he has) I’ve genuinely never read Godin…
Thanks Steve! Appreciate the vote of confidence! I’m now following your blog and I’m going to head over to Twitter to follow you there too. Looking forward to reading and connecting with you more.
When I feel like a rabbit in headlights I always read this quote. Your post made me think of it. I know of so many people who are just as smart and talented etc as me and I see the only difference on why they are more successful is because they believe in them selves more than i do. Just got to suck it up and go for it!
Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate, our greatest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be fabulous, brilliant, talented and gorgeous? Actually, who are you not to be, you are a child of God and your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightening about shrinking so that others won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, like children do. We are born to make manifest the glory of God within us. It is not just in some of us; it is in every one of us. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give people permission to do the same. As we are liberated by our fears, our presence automatically liberates others. Nelson Mandela
Being confident is important in most aspects of life. It definitely helps you make more money!
Number 2 is such a powerful reminder – to me and to anyone who wants to live a life that is growing instead of withering away to insignificance. You said:
“True success comes from engaging with the things that matter to you and taking continued, meaningful action. But that’s only possible if you sweep aside the rules and expectations that don’t serve you.
Set aside the rules that don’t make sense, and make a firm decision to engage with something that has personal meaning — on your own terms.”
Living on someone else’s terms is a great way to become demoralized and worn out. When my daughter started college this year it only took two weeks for her to realize that she was in the driver’s seat of her own life. SHE could set aside the rules that don’t make sense and it was now HER decision to engage with something that has personal meaning – on her own terms.
Last weekend my daughter came home and announced she was changing majors. Brava!
Asking and answering the tough questions and being willing to “change majors” in business when necessary would serve us all well. At least I can say that for myself.
Thanks for a great post, Steve.
Pat
Getting scared is what’s going to motivated you to strive for that comfort by working harder until you reached security. If you’re always in your comfort place, you won’t want to move and change out of fear of getting uncomfortable by moving away from your comforty, cozzy, little hole.
You want success and security like a mad-man when you are no longer have that security and like fighting for your life.
In reference to number 4 and 6, inaction is worse to the wrong action. Those who are afraid to fail or not succeed often end up doing nothing. This is far worse than performing the wrong actions, failing, or missing completely. Atleast from failure we can learn to correct our actions. Just take the first steps, take risks, and you will eventually be rewarded.
Confidence for me is hard to come by sometimes. I will defiantly reread this post and learn to be more self-confident and will start reading Steve’s blog post.
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