One of the most overwhelming words in the English dictionary is fear. Fear is something that holds 95% of my friends back from realizing their ultimate potential. If you have a fear of moving forward in life to achieving your greatest goals, today’s episode is for you.
Good morning! This is Jimmy Williams with Live a Life by Design. Your Monday morning moments of motivation. I was called the other day ‘The Pastor of Positivity’. I’ll claim that today. Thank you for joining me.
We’re going to tackle something that is on the minds of many of the worlds’ citizens today. The global markets have been in decline. Oil and gas industries, decimated. Why am I telling you these negativities to start your week? It’s because I’m going to also give you the tools to overcome this thinking on fear.
You know fear is nothing more than an acronym. F-E-A-R – it stands for the False Evidence Appearing Real. Our minds are so powerful, it doesn’t take a whole lot of energy for our mind to go into survival mode. The survival mode is determined by the fear conjured up in our mind to keep us from doing something that could bring harm to the body.
You know, I’ve heard of people that have a fear of heights. A fear of insects. I’ve heard of people that have fears of all types, and the point I want to make today is, you can overcome each and everyone of them. In our world today we have allowed fear to overcome us. Environmental fear, such as the coronavirus, which is taking and should be taken very seriously. But has caused mass hysteria to such a degree in our world it has affected our global markets. Ripples of this type of fear has caused market sectors, such as I said earlier, Oil, to plunge to all time lows due to oversupply.
So, today I wish to share with you three strategies that I personally use to help overcome any fear that may arise in my life. And I may be 55 years of age, however, I focus on some of the fears that I must attack, literally on a daily basis. Fear is not just subject to those people that are not accomplishing entrepreneurs. Fear attacks all of us. From the President of the United States down to just Jimmy Williams, Mr. Citizen.
Strategy No. 1: Run Towards Your Fear
You, though, have within you, the power to overcome these fears. I’m gonna give you our three strategies today that we use, as I said, to overcome fear and not just overcome them, but to overcome them confidently. So let’s take strategy #1. Run toward your fear. Now, man, on the front side of this, you’re thinking is this gentleman crazy. Run toward your fear. During WWII, submarine captains were fearless and brave sailors. Knowing the details of how a torpedo is built, operates, the timing mechanisms for the explosions and so forth. The captain, when was facing a torpedo toward his submarine by an adversary, would understand that adversary’s style of fighting.
For example, certain countries had a style of fighting their battles, that their generals would inform the captains of the submarines, and they were learned by their opponent, and then you could control the way you think about the attack. So the torpedo was fired. The captain then, would turn his submarine into the path of the torpedo and proceed toward the oncoming target.
His crew, no doubt exhibiting the signs of ultimate demise, were reassured by the leadership of their captain that he was knowledgeable and had faced this situation before. As the oncoming torpedo approached, the submarine would be hit by the torpedo. But by reducing the timing of the torpedos explosion, the weapon simply bounced off the outer hull of the submarine, falling to the ocean floor without discharging.
In a similar fate of the submarine captain, you must take action to overcome your fear. Inaction will only allow your fear to grow and become controlling of your mind. If you have a fear of speaking in front of audiences, ask to speak in front of your team at the next office meeting to gain your confidence. Ask to speak in front of your civic club to help you gain control of your emotions. Increase the number of people in your audience each time you speak and you will eventually become a confident speaker in front of thousands of people.
When I began speaking as a career, I had such confidence that I would place a thought in my mind that every person in that audience was anxious to hear my presentation and no one in the audience knew my subject better than I. Another fear I faced as a kid was the fear of snakes. Now, I was raise in rural America and I had encountered some of our friends, the snakes, at most inopportune times. One time that I do recall specifically, I was younger, I was probably about 10-11 years of age. I was down at our barn where we had hay stored. And I went to climb up on the hay bales, just playing as we always did as kids. We had to go find a place to play. And so we went there. And it was always fun building hay forts and all of these things. And so I jumped up on some hay, and felt this real kinda slimy feeling under my hands as I was reaching up to sit down on this hay bale. And goodness there he was. Nice, long blue racer. This snake is non venomous, thank goodness and it kills rats and mice and other vermin around the barn. And so it keeps down the rodent population.
Well, I didn’t like to make friends with the snakes, but I had to overcome this fear. So if we’re going to co-exist. Now this could be applied to humans. If we’re going to co-exist with others that may be different than we, we must learn to find common ground. So to overcome this fear of snakes I would seek out opportunities to interact with pythons and other nonvenomous snakes. In my teens, I was a member of the Boy Scouts. I loved the Boy Scout program. I was a senior patrol leader. Again you see that entrepreneurial instinct coming out as a young man. I served on staff at our local Boy Scout camp and they asked me which merit badges I wished to teach. Immediately I answered reptiles. We had a merit badge in that area. This entailed me teaching other scouts about snakes and other reptiles in the environment.
During one week of camp, I caught a garter snake and kept it with me to exhibit to my students that most species of snakes are helpful to mankind. Now at this time, if you have a terrible fear of snakes, you’re probably getting goosebumps on your arms, you’re probably really kind of shivering and giving me that I don’t like snakes, kind of look. But there are very few species of poisonous snakes in the United States, and there are many many more of non venomous species of snakes. Well, to continue my story, it was scout camp and at that Friday evening called parents night. When all the parents came to see what their children had accomplished the week of camp. Merit badges they had achieved. To see what they had grown in terms of young men. My mother and father came to see me as a counselor. As I raced up to my mom to hug her, I calmly placed the garter snake around my neck as I had carried it most of that week.
Having no fear of this snake, being non-venomous. It had never attempted to bite or even strike at me the entire week, because I was very calm in handling it. You see, I found a way to relate to that animal that it knew it feared nothing of me. See this is where I have to correlate how we are with others of our mankind. When we are approached by someone with a different background, different ethnicity, different beliefs, we immediately get defensive and making certain that they, the other person, doesn’t somehow infringe on our beliefs. For just a moment, if we could open our mind and our hearts, if you will. To allowing ourselves to find the common ground that most people wish to find. Which is peace and tranquility. Everyone wishes to have a relationship with their fellow man that is positive. I firmly believe this. But as I raced up to hug my mom. Had the garter snake around my neck. As mom wrapped her arms around me and began to give me a kiss on the cheek, well, she saw ‘Arty”. Yeah, that was his name, we named him Arty the garter snake.
He was simply there slithering his little forked tongue at her, trying to figure out what this new scent was. Probably from her perfume or something she had had on. The shriek from my mother was loud enough to capture the attention of hundreds of people in the mess hall. Oh, I didn’t mention, we were in the “cafeteria” getting ready to dine. There were hundreds of people there. The look on my mother’s face. Her eyes were so big, you’d have thought she had seen a cobra. And it was a simple little garter snake. Well, to shorten this story a little bit, my mom overcame her fear of snakes that same evening. So, run toward your fear.
Strategy No. 2: Paint a Vision of Yourself Overcoming Your Fear
Strategy #2 to defeating fear in our lives is to paint a vision of yourself overcoming the fear. You know, I’m a CPA and have been for 32 years. And always possessed in my mind an entrepreneurial attitude. After resigning from a very secure position on track to becoming a partner at an international CPA firm, many of my friends thought I had lost my mind. After describing in detail the next step in my career, including the benefits and challenges. My friends were more understanding but couldn’t believe I would take such a bold step. The point I’m making with this comment is, these steps that challenge our every being to overcoming any fear must be delivered in a bold manner.
Timidity will not gain you the inner focus you need to stay on track. Any change you make in your life, you must have confidence. We only gain confidence and grow when we are stretched beyond that which we currently experience. You must be bold in your steps as you grow as a professional and as a person. After 20 years in my successful and now very profitable business, I always desired to help individuals realize their futures instead of simply working on their past. Another incredible step was needed in my career. Again I described in detail what success in my envisioned role would look like. Many people again were in shock that I would take such a bold move after all the success, after all that’s been attained. I had a larger team of people that worked with me. And it was time for me to take another bold move.
Well, we had grown every year in this new venture that I’m currently in helping others realize their futures. We have grown so successfully, we have doubled in size in terms of revenues and profit every three years. Folks, we have been blessed beyond belief, as I say, in the role we play now in helping you and others paint their future so vivid and then help them achieve that vision that they tell their friends. And that’s how we’ve ultimately grown as a company. To overcome the fear of change, you as the leader, as responsible for clearly painting the picture of success with your team members roles, fully described reflecting their success.
You see you can’t be successful as an island. No it truly does take a village for you as a leader to achieve the ultimate of success. And each one, as if on a rowboat, must be rowing at the same time, in synchronicity to keep that boat moving straight forward instead of wasting energy and time by zig zagging all over the water so that each person realizes their potential and the contribution to overall success. So strategy #2, paint a vision of yourself overcoming the fear.
Thank you for your awesome reviews on iTunes. This podcast is only being able to be produced weekly by the great support by people just like you. This review is from miataguy: “What a great way to start your week by hopping in your car, ready to take on the world and be motivated and inspired by Jimmy. These podcasts have really helped me with my thinking, planning, and goal setting at the office and home. Subscribe today and get motivated!” Thank you, miataguy for such a heartwarming review. Now, back to the show.
Strategy No. 3: Focus on the things you can control
Our 3rd strategy for defeating fear in your life is focus on the things you can control. The things you can control. To overcome any fear, you must not allow yourself to be overwhelmed by facts, people, or limitations that you cannot control. When faced with a challenge, always look at the factors you can exert control over to gain confidence in the process. Steve Maraboli had a great quote, “Incredible change happens in your life when you decide to take control over what you do have power over instead of craving control over what you don’t”. Man that is profound. The areas of your life you can control are relationships, thoughts, financial, physical well being, learning, etc.
You can gain momentum over your fear by clearly placing your actions and energies in these areas. When we take our eyes off the areas we can control, we lose valuable energy, focus and allow negativity to creep back into your minds. The current market conditions are one example of anxiety for many investors. We often educate our clients with the following statement, “We can’t control the markets, but we can control your participation in them”. Our clients quickly understand that they do not have to feel powerless against such a force as the global economy. When confronted with this type of challenge consider the areas of your finances you can control. Remind yourself of the reasons you invested for your future. If, like most of us, you are a long term investor, don’t allow short term disruptions to take your eyes off the goal.
It is critical to your long term success to understand that bumps will be encountered along the way. No highway that’s smooth as glass will take you to where your ultimate future will lie. No worthwhile endeavor is ever paved with success without challenges. You can and must overcome the fear that forces you to defeat. You are in control of your mind. Your actions and your future. Keep up the mindset that you developed when you started investing in that future. Don’t allow doubt and fear to rob you of the security you deserve. Fear is faced by all of us at one time or another in our lives. Utilize these three strategies and overcome, let’s defeat fear with a smile on our faces.
Your confidence to achieve your goals will soar when your mindset is calm and focused on the future you wish to realize. So, let’s go back and revisit our three strategies today that give us the powerful tools to overcome and defeat fear in our lives. Strategy #1 – Run toward the fear. It is not a time to retreat, but a time to advance. #2 – Paint a vision of yourself overcoming your fear. What does success look like in your mind? When you first started the venture you’re in currently, what did success look like to you? Go out, seek that success, and paint that vision, even more vivid during these difficult times. And strategy #3 – Focus on the things you can control. These three strategies have been instrumental in helping me overcome fears that arise in my life. Choose to be proactive, not reactive to fear and implement these strategies today. You will be glad you did. Thanks for joining me this week, and we’ll see you next week as you continue to live your life by design.
