Illumined Life Leadership

Been in this place before? You take a huge leap of faith and the rath of fear strikes hard?

“What in the hell did I just do?”

“Who am I to think that I can do this?”

“What if I fail?”

Yes, all these questions and many more have poured through my brain over the last month. As positive as I believe I am (it just happens to be my #3 top strength according to Strengths Finder), how could I not expect to have these kinds of thoughts?

I guess it was no coincidence that the day I decide to write this blog (about fear) I receive the Entrepreneur Magazine with the cover article, “Be Fearless Without Being Scared.” It caught my attention.

Even better was the Editor’s note (Amy C. Cosper) on her very real fearful experience of having an exciting new venture idea and scoring a meeting with a hard to reach VC. Here’s a blurb…

(After confirming the meeting) “Instantly, my veins felt colder. My idea no longer felt exciting. It felt like a horrible secret I’d have to real—like a think I’d take out of my briefcase and say, in my most pathetic voice, ‘This is all I have.’”

Whoa. I can relate with that! With Ideation as my #4 top talent I have no shortage of ideas (constantly!!). Although I want to move at the speed of light, it’s not always easy to pick the right idea, trust in it, and ship it! In our “stick to one idea” world of today, it’s not easy to have so many ideas without talking yourself out of all of them.

So, you may be asking… “What are you doing about the fear?”

Well, two things…

1. I’m using my fearful voice as a mechanism to do be aware, and to do my homework. After all, fear just wants to protect us from failure. So, I’ll take a thought like, “Who are you to think you can do this?” and I’ll do my very best to find the evidence that I need to quiet that fear and replace it with some self-love and respect. If I’ve found some truth to the fear, then I address it. “What if I fail?” is a great one, because there truly is the chance that I could, indeed, fail! That can be the case for anyone tackling any new project. So, what will my response be if I do fail? I actually think it’s a good question to answer.
2. I’m using my fearful voice as motivation. At the end of the day I would rather have tried and failed than to not have tried at all. That’s a quote, isn’t it? Well, the good thing for me is that one of the ways my Positivity strength works is to shift me out of negativity very quickly, allowing me to always see a silver lining. Amy also wrote this, and I couldn’t agree with her more:

“Fear sucks. It really does. It is a raw emotion that stands between you and your greatness. It invades your body and makes you forget you ever had strength. And it is the reason you didn’t Didn’t chase that dream. Didn’t take the risk. Didn’t give yourself the opportunity to see what’s on the other side: the dream achieved, the risk rewarded, the person who survived jumping in and now understands the value of taking a leap in the first place.  

#Truth.

And it was Amy’s truth. She didn’t have a good meeting with that VC. She blew it. Fear killed it. BUT, what an incredible failure to learn from. I’m inspired by her honesty and vulnerability.

Yep. I’ve had a few fearful moments since I left my “safe world” in late January. And, well, it’s just par for the course!

So, Now What?

As most of you know, my work is in the space of leadership and well-being, and my blog and newsletter content won’t change. In fact, I want you to know how committed I am to that world, and I’m uber passionate about all of it. In fact, this year you’ll see me broaden my topics and trainings in order to truly put out all that I want to share and how I want to make a difference with my work.

In the same breathe, now as a solo/mom-preneur, I also plan to blog about how it’s going, and how I’m making it work for me. I’m excited to share this aspect of my life now that I’m living it, and I hope that this content will help many of you who are entrepreneurs, or are inspired to go this route one day soon.

Namaste,

Monique