Conquer These Three Fears and Success Will Be Yours

The fears I’m referring to are not like the fear of heights, or of monsters.

No.

The fears I’m talking about are more subtle but yet, more impactful to your life. In fact, you know them quite well.

They are fear of:

The Unknown
Failure
What People Might Think

These are the most stifling, debilitating and most paralyzing fears I know of. You can be the most intelligent, most gifted individual on the planet, but if you are under the spell of any of these three fears, it will be virtually impossible to get anywhere near your highest potential.

Your greatest rewards in life, are waiting just on the other side of these fears. Let’s start with the fear of the unknown.

The Unknown

This fear can stop the most brilliant person from pursuing an endeavor, just because they can’t see or predict every single step along the way.

There are many who just can’t fathom taking ‘leaps of faith’, or stepping into the unknown.

But is that what living is all about?

Granted, it’s very helpful and mostly expected of you to plan and plot your steps through life. However, there will ultimately be moments and situations where you’ll have to cross a void of unknown circumstances and outcomes, in order to get to your destination.

Let me share something that may help.

In February 2012, I packed up my family of four, with everything we owned in the back of our Chevy Venture minivan and headed to Orlando Florida. I honestly did not know what to expect.

There were so many unknowns.

Too many to name.

For instance, I didn’t know we were going to catch a flat on the interstate at 3 am in morning, with no exit in site.

I didn’t know that the home we paid a deposit on, to move my family into when we got to Florida, was actually a scam and the property did not actually exist.

I didn’t know I would have to move my family into a hotel until we found another place to live.

These are just a few of the unknowns I faced when deciding to move my family to Florida back in 2012.

Just on the other side of those unknown challenges, awaited a newly built home here in Florida, new cars, thriving community and beach visits almost every weekend.

That made it all worth it.

Had I remained floundering in fear of the unknown, my family and I would have never been able to experience this.

Here’s the secret!

Two things: Vision and Desire

The vision of moving to Florida and the unwavering desire to get there.

That’s it!

Yes, for months I planned as much of the move as possible, with the information and resources we had. But it was the vision and the desire to get there, that filled in those gaps and voids of the unknowns.

The Lesson: to overcome fears of the unknown, let your vision and your desire be the driving forces.

Fear of Failure

This fear is the reason why many don’t even attempt to achieve certain goals nor pursue certain opportunities in life.

Ask the questions:

What’s truly behind the fear of failing?

Is it embarrassment?

Is it Shame?

Ok, let’s be real here. Yes, failing at something can definitely bring about shame and embarrassment.

But, let’s be fair and honest. Failing at something also brings about: wisdom, knowledge and experience.

Who can know, what they can or cannot do, until they step out and attempt to do it?

Even if you fail at something, it instantly puts you ahead of all those who never even tried, due to their fear of failure.

There’s a saying, “..fail forward”.

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This means that even when you attempt and fail at something, you have still progressed forward in the process.

I’ve failed at many things in my time. However, I realized one day that by harvesting all the things I experienced from those failures, I had acquired a wealth of wisdom and valuable advice that I could share with others who were coming along after me.

That since of value provided me with one simple question to ask yourself, anytime you ‘fail’ at something.

That question is: “What did I learn”?

Asking yourself that question whenever you fail at something, will reveal so many valuable details and lessons from your experience, that it will no longer feel like a failure at all.

Fear of What They Think

Now this one is tricky.

Why?

Because it usually rears its ugly head, right in the middle, or when you’re only a few steps from reaching your goal.

This fear is also quite a challenge because, the human psyche comes with a feeling of wanting to belong and to be accepted.

This is the choice you’ll have to make:

Let the true, unique and authentic version of yourself shine through, in all its power and beauty or…

…shrink into the box of conformity and acceptance, in order to please others around you.

Again I ask, is that living?

Let me share something else to help you see what I mean.

Many years ago after graduating high-school, I’d finally found what I wanted to be.

A Psychologist.

I was so excited when I enrolled in the program at the college! I envisioned myself walking up to the stage to received my PhD, and imagined helping thousands of people around the world.

I went back to my family and told them how excited I was. I expected them to be happy for me, and proud of me. Well, the first question I heard when I told them was, “How are you going to make money doing that?”

I could see and hear the disappointment in their voice.

I replied, ”I’m going to help so many people, I’m going to write books and this is what I really want to do!”

The next response I heard was, “don’t you want to go into Engineering or Tech?”

See, many of the other teens in our church and community were enrolling in Engineering, Medical and Finance programs. So I guess it was expected of me to choose one of those fields.

Do you know what haunts me even to this day? It’s the fact that I went back to the college admissions office the next day and changed my major to Business Administration, because I wanted them to be proud of me.

Let’s be honest here, I was afraid of what they would think of me if I pursued a career in Psychology.

Though I’ve been able to find significant success in business and technology, I’ve never been passionate about neither of those fields.

The lesson you want to grab from this is, to never give in to the fear of what people might think of you and your dreams.

Why?

Well, because growing old with the thought of “what if?” or “I should have”, will haunt you to the end, especially if you know deep down that you had something special, something unique, something significant, something different to do in your life.

A very wise man once said to me, “ you could kiss everybody’s feet in this room, and somebody is still gonna complain about the way you kissed their stinkin’ foot.”

With that thought I was able to grasp the reality that you are not here to please anyone. That’s not your job, not your purpose.

Always remember this:

“Whether you do good or bad, whether you succeed or fail, people are always gonna think what they want, about you”.

Do a quick search of the names mentioned below, and how their amazing accomplishments were due to the fact that they were not afraid of what people would think:

Albert Einstein, Nikola Tesla, Dr. Martin Luther King, Joan of Arc, Helen Keller, Ida B. Wells, Delores Huerta

In the story of Noah’s Ark, he and his family would have perished had he stopped building his ark, in fear of what the people in his village thought of him and what he was doing. Despite the ridicule, Noah kept building.

If Jeff Bezos would have given in to the fear of what people would think, when he left his Finance job to start Amazon, he would not be the billionaire we know today.

Take a moment now and from time-to-time, to reflect on these examples as you progress through your life.

Make three promises to yourself, right now to:

1)Allow your vision and desire to override fear of the unknown.

2) Look forward to the wisdom and experience you will gain, whenever you sense the fear of failure. (also think about, what if you don‘t fail?)

3) When faced with the fear of what people may think, just remind yourself that the quality of your life, is not based on what other people think, it’s what you think and believe, about yourself.

So let those fears die, so you can live!

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This post was previously published on medium.com.