One of my Achilles' heels is my great ability to over think seemingly simple things. One of my favorite personality tests is Strength Finders. I am excessively positive, which is reflected in my #1 Strength, Positivity. This gift allows me to find the "silver lining" or bright spot in even the most challenging situations.
Sadly, to accent this strength is my #4 "Ideation", which helps me to be able to come up with hundreds of ideas in order to accomplish, or overcome challenges. The reason this is sad is because I lack any Strength that is tied with "Achievement". While I am positive, and I have a great deal of creative ideas, I struggle with actually putting any of them into action.
My thought process often comes to a grinding halt when it becomes time to take action. Cursed by best of intentions I have seen many dreams for myself fizzle out, or never even get off the starting line, due to my lack of the "Make it Happen" gene. Sure, I can be motivated to accomplish some things, but they are rarely the things that I dream about, or aspire to. Then I discovered that it was not a lack ability to accomplish, it was fear.
Fear is a crippler. As I considered all the ideas and dreams that never started I found that the reason they were not pursued was due to a deep fear of feeling like it would fail before I even gave it a shot. Fear of not being good enough, or fear that I would not sound smart enough, or that I had nothing of value to add, so I should just stay quiet and keep to my lane. Turns our my paralysis was caused by fear due to over analysis.
How to break the cycle of unfulfilled dreams and great ideas left in the waste basket? It begins with overcoming fear. I wish the answer was simple, however, the complexity of each individual means that there is no one size fits all solution. One of the best pieces of advise I ever received was from a certified counselor. He said when I was was feeling anxious or fearful, I just needed to do it once. Then the next time would be easier because I had already done it before.
This seemed simple, and yet, every time I tried something new I had to battle with fear. Its funny to me because the number one fear for most people is public speaking, something that comes very easy to me as I do it multiple times a week. Yet, when it came to writing this blog, I was afraid that no one would care, or that it might not be well received. Following the advice of my counselor from over a decade ago, I started yesterday, and true enough today was easier because I had already done it once.
What dream have you been afraid to start??? Today is a great day to call day 1, and then day 2 will be easier.
Starting another business, after a previous attempt failed!