Is the fear of uncertainty holding you back and stopping you from living the life you deserve?
If you want to change something for the better, you need to get out of your comfort zone.
Well that’s nothing new is it? No big light-bulb moment there.
But no matter how strong and resilient we are, when faced with uncertainty we can stumble a little, hesitate, and can doubt creep in.
The only thing worse than the fear of uncertainty is the pain of regret. ‘What if’ is one of the most awful regrets to have. Sometimes you need to take a risk to get what is it that you want in life – if you don’t then one day you may realise that time has run out to do the things you always wanted to do.
I truly believe that the only thing that holds you back from getting the things you want in this life is you —or, to be more precise, your fears.
Yet if you can rise above that fear of uncertainty and see it as positive rather than negative, you can achieve the success mindset needed to propel you towards your goals and dreams.
You can never completely eliminate fear. But you must learn to master your fear if
you want to succeed and live the life that you really want for you.
I have found that there are 7 steps that help me during the most challenging, unexpected or unpredictable times in my life.
Step 1 – What can you learn? We can learn something from every situation that we face – about ourselves, about other people, about how to do things differently next time. What decisions can you make that will make a positive impact on this situation? What can you learn that will help you to move forward?
Step 2 – Face your fear. Usually when we get scared we want to run away from the situation and back into our comfort zone where we feel safe. The problem is that if you do this then you will be cheating yourself. Look at what it is that you fear. Is it really as bad as you imagined? Or do you already possess the resources and skills to keep moving through the fear?
Step 3 – Manage your thinking. Do you understand that our thoughts create our reality and that our thoughts actually drive our responses to the situations we meet?
Are you constantly repeating mentally, “I’m never going to do this,” “it’s no use, I can’t pull this off,” or “How do I know that this will be any better than what I already have. It could be worse.” This type of thinking can easily turn into “It’s safer if I don’t bother. At least I know where I am and what to expect if I stay where I am”.
Where is your thinking today? Are you allowing yourself to stay stuck with negative thoughts that stifle you and keep you imprisoned in your comfort zone? If so, then you need to free yourself. We can all decide for ourselves how we choose to respond to uncertainty. We can choose to see only the negative aspects, feel afraid and run back into familiarity. Or we can choose to acknowledge the fear, change our thoughts to be more realistic of the situation and look at how we can move through the fear and into success. And one way to do this is to ask questions.
Step 4 – Learn from others. Ask questions from others who have successfully gone through what you’re going through now? How did they manage that? Ask them what they did and how they did it so that you can learn from them. That doesn’t mean you have to copy exactly what they did – but you just might gain a few nuggets of wisdom that can help you.
Step 5 – Have a plan. Again ask questions, but this time ask yourself – What is the worst that could happen realistically – note the word ‘realistically’ please? What is the likelihood that the worst will happen? If the worst were to happen, what would I need to do to prepare? Then, and only then, can you put a plan in place.
A good plan can help you to work out your options if the worst happens. It gives you a backup plan because most of the time our fears are there because we haven’t thought out what options we have. But remember, don’t plan too much. After all, life is filled with unexpected things and your view of the future is limited.
Then ask yourself this final question .. What are all the things that could be really positive and great about this?
Step 6 – Find the Funny Side. Sometimes this is difficult to do, but really look for the humour in the situation because it will make it less scary. Laughter can unblock your creativity and help you to find solutions that you simply can’t see when you’re feeling tense.
Step 7 – Take Action – NOW! Don’t wait any longer, do something, anything, that moves you forward – just one step. The longer you hesitate and wait for ‘the right time’, the harder it is to overcome the fear because you’ll find all sorts of ‘reasons’ not to take that first step.
You will never get rid of every butterfly in your stomach – don’t wait until you feel ‘ready’ because you never will. Sometimes a leap of faith is required.
So what is your first, or next, move?
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If your artciels are always this helpful, I’ll be back.