If The Fear Fits, Don't Wear It!
Undoubtedly one of the most challenging tasks we can face everyday is fighting the fear of failure. At one time or another every single person has had to face the fear of stepping out into an unfamiliar area and leaving his comfort zone and entering the twilight zone.
In Over Your Head?
Probably one of the biggest reasons we hesitate to step out of our boat and walk on the water is the thought, "what if I sink?" Well, what if you do? What is the worse thing that will happen to you? Have you considered it?
If you haven't, then you're not ready to take the plunge. That may sound overly simplistic, but here is something you need to take to heart! "The devil you know is better than the devil you don't." In other words, examine the details in the devil.
The more you know the more the fear of failure will diminish. You will never have all the answers beforehand so just forget that. If you had all the answers, you would probably never fail. Michael Jordan said, "I have failed over and over again in my life, and that is why I succeed!"
Sounds like a contradiction doesn't it? You mean failure brings success? Yes! But, guess what? Success doesn't continue uninterrupted. Sooner or later the cycle turns and you experience another failure.
Round And Round She Goes!
Why is that? Cause I said so! Nah.. I lied; I just wanted to see if you were listening. It happens because everything in this universe goes in cycles. Life cycles to death, sowing cycles to reaping, failure cycles to success.
You may remember the story of Babe Ruth. During his career he was the home run king of baseball. He hit over 700 home runs. He had another statistic that was not much publicized. He was also the strike out king.
Yea, he struck out over 1400 times in his career. On one instance, a reporter was interviewing Babe Ruth and suggested that he slow up on his swing because he had fallen in the dirt several times during a game that day. Babe told the reporter to pity the poor pitchers and not him.
Consider this: The most successful people in life are the ones who have failed the most often. The thing that distinguishes them from others is they are not afraid to risk it all. Remember this: "it's one thing to talk about bull fighting; it's another thing to get in the ring with that bull!"
Just Between You And Me And The Fence Post!
A number of years ago I used to trade the futures markets. Now granted, it was certainly not as physically dangerous as bull fighting. But the excitement would send your adrenalin through the roof.
To see some of the emotions that I and others would experience you would think that we did have 6,000 pounds of Black Angus beef charging to do a tap dance on our heads.
Early in the morning we would discuss our strategy for the day and we were all in agreement that if "such and such" happened, we would take appropriate action. Well, when "such and such" did happen, we found ourselves reasoning with ourselves and allowed the fear of failure to jack our emotions up and down like a toilet seat at a mixed party.
When the time was right to pull the trigger, and "get in the ring with that bull," you could hear a pin drop. We saw the perfect conditions, we saw our indicators tell us what to do, but, we sat there as if we were saying, "I don't really think that fat meat is greasy!" Yeah, right! Get in that trade Boy!
Made My Hair Stand On End!
Why did we act like that? We had planned, we had studied, we had analyzed those chart patterns until it got our knickers in a twist. And, we knew just how much risk we were willing to take, but still sat there as nervous as a pregnant possum!
And, you know what happened? Yep, you guessed it, our trade got away and we missed out on a great profit. Why? Fear of failure!
Then there were other times when the trade went the wrong way, so we would sit there and pat ourselves on back for being so "wise" and not letting that trade sucker punch us. Yeah, right, real wise!
My point is: fear of failure can paralyze the best laid plans of mice and men. The fear of getting into those trades was causing our failure. Fear was causing the failure, not inexperience, not lack of preparation, but fear.
Not Until Pigs Fly! How was it doing it? There is one thing you must never do with fear! Reason with it! Fear will always drag you down. It will always make you go backwards. Reasoning with fear will always take you away from your dream.
When you are reasoning with fear you are simply second guessing your decisions. Have you done your planning? Have you done your preparation? Have you assessed the possible outcomes? Then take the plunge and don't give reasoning a chance to immobilize you.
Getting into a habit of reasoning with fear will cause you to begin compromising what you expect and want from your goal. You will tell yourself, "Maybe I'm expecting too much." "Maybe I should settle for less."
When you begin reasoning like that, you will find it very easy to start settling for something less. Then, you will even begin reasoning that maybe you don't deserve what you got. Compromise like that a few times and you will begin losing what you got; not to mention what you want.
Taken To The Cleaners!
If you have some fear that is holding you back then realize this: Think of your mind as a container. In your mind there must always be a substance in there that motivates you. It can be fear or faith.
Don't allow yourself to become double minded. When you become double minded you're attempting to operate in faith and fear at the same time. I.E. second guessing your decisions. One minute you're confident, the next minute you couldn't punch your way out of a wet paper bag.
Believe me, I've been there, done that, and won the T-shirt. If you want to rid yourself of fear, you must replace it with something else or it will come back. Faith is what you want to replace it with.
Your Mission In Life!
You cannot have an empty container. There will always be a force trying to fill that container with something. Don't let it be fear. Fear can't stay in your mind if you pull the trigger by avoiding reasoning with fear.
Richard Vegas ©
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