What’s holding you back?

There’s something going on here that stops us from doing what we know.  It’s hidden, it’s a mystery.  We all have it, but rarely know what to do about it, and worse, rarely acknowledge it.

It’s fear.

Why don’t we eat healthier?  Why don’t we have those difficult conversations with our employees?  Why do you put up with bad behavior in the workplace?  We’re afraid of change and doing things that are uncomfortable.  We do everything we can to avoid this and make every excuse we can.

I found a great process to tackle this from Leo Babauta who has a blog called Zen Habits.

The Do Plan

Here’s the plan … don’t just read it, but do it!

1.  Learn by doing. Don’t learn by reading. Of course, a little reading is helpful, but if you read, just read a little, then do. Don’t learn by talking. We talk too much already. Start doing, and if you’re going to talk, talk while doing. In the doing, you learn what gaps you have that are stopping you, you learn how there are steps you don’t know or haven’t figured out. Then you take action to fill in those gaps, figure out the steps, and keep moving.

2.  Write down your fears. If you’re having trouble doing, fear is stopping you. What are you afraid of? What do you think you’re not good enough for? What belief do you have that’s keeping you from doing something? Write these down. The writing is an action.

3.  Now do away your fears. We’re going to beat the fears by doing. Afraid of writing? Just do 2 minutes of it. That’s such a small amount, such a small commitment, it’s not that scary. By doing something in such small steps, we learn that the fears aren’t true — that we can do it and not completely fail.

4.  See failure as a learning tool. We’re deathly afraid of failing. Failure is an indication of something we can learn. Failure is a necessary step in learning — if you can already do something perfectly, you’re not learning anything. You have to fail, reiterate the process in a new way, and then succeed. Failure is an opportunity.

5.  Adjust, and do some more. The process is act, fail, learn, adjust, then act again. Once you’ve failed at something, figure out how you can adjust, then try again. This new attempt might be better, or maybe not. If it’s not, adjust again, try again. Keep adjusting until you’ve figure it out, and then move on to the next step. There’s no plan that can tell you exactly how to do something without failure. No map is exactly right. You have to take action and adjust as you go. This is the key skill that you’ll learn with this process — how to get good at adjusting.

Fear is not the determining factor in our lives. It doesn’t tell us how our lives will go. It is only a little child’s voice in the back of our minds, trying to get its way, trying to avoid discomfort. But we can learn that discomfort isn’t horrible; it is the feeling of exploring new territory, climbing a new peak, pushing to new levels.

We can beat fear.  Start right now.

What do you do to beat your fear?  Anything resonate with you?  Leave your comments below.

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