Be Fearless Today

What’s on your agenda for today? Are you planning to accomplish great things? Are you planning to just get through the day? I always want to do great things with my day. I always want to be the rock star. I always want to chase perfection if only to catch excellence. I have amazing plans & intentions. And I rarely accomplish them. I find myself pondering “Why?”. Much of the time it is because I’m afraid. I have a white board in my office (actually, I have a couple of them, but I digress) & at the top of the one overlooking my monitors it says – Be Fearless Today

I don’t like to admit it, but I am afraid sometimes. I’m not confident some days. Fear can stop me from accomplishing the amazing dreams & plans I have set forth to bring into our world. Many times, I don’t even know it’s fear that’s holding me in its grasp. I have found; I really have to investigate my motivations for why I’m stalling or procrastinating. Usually, it’s hidden behind an excuse, or a plethora of excuses. Sometimes even a mountain of excuses or deflections hide the fear. Oh, and they tend to be well crafted too. I’m a king of rationalization. This makes cutting through the obstacles all the more challenging because I really have to fight to be honest with myself. To clear away the debris & well-constructed self-protection, the armor to keep me safe from the ridicule of peers is frightening. It scares the hell out of me. To be vulnerable, splayed open for the world to see, criticize, & laugh, to be honest giving others the ability to see the real me, is, well, tough. No one wants the pain. No one wants to be thought of as the crazy one. We all have a desire to be accepted by our tribe, and it seems counter intuitive to expect the acceptance we crave to be found in the place we fear most. Being who we truly are. In Seth Godin’s amazing podcast “Seth Godin’s Startup School” he says “They need to look for the fear. Over and over and over again this comes down to where is your fear? Where is your soft spot? Where is that thing you are protecting? When we somehow let go of our guard & expose that soft spot is when we do our best work” and he goes on to say “When I find somebody who keeps jumping from thing to thing, or gets stuck, sooner or later it’s going to come down to their fear.”

Here’s the thing. This is exactly where we find what we are looking for. This is not only how we find the acceptance we desire, but how we find our tribe in the first place. When we raise our hand & say “This is me. This is how I feel. If you do too, then you are not alone – I’m your tribe” we become a beacon at which to gather for others in our tribe. We send out the signal to those around us saying, “Come join us in the sunlight!”.

When we expose our fear & face it down & embrace it, we steal the power it has over us. When we accept our fear is the thing which keeps us from being who we want to be, not our lack of talent, or our situation, or our circumstances, when we accept our fear is the thief keeping us from accomplishing what we want to accomplish, we can then focus on overcoming the fear and marching boldly to the great moments ahead. You are an amazing individual. There is no one else who has ever been or will ever be who is the same as you. You are precious. There will never be another & we need you. You are a plain ordinary dragon!

Realize it’s fear. Identify the fear. Lead with the fear. Then grab your moment with both hands & Be Fearless today!

2 Comments

  1. HI! I’ve tried to focus on being a tiny bit brave. Small victories lead to bigger ones. A philosophy of “small” has really helped me.

    I hope you’re well.

    1. That’s a great way to approach it! You can always find small places to start. A little bit at a time can certainly grow confidence. That’s something I’m certainly going to look to incorporate into my life more – small victories leading to big ones.

      Hope all is good in your world!

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.