I Don’t Even Know What I’m Afraid Of!

Are you old enough to remember fold-out paper maps. You know the ones they used to give out free, and then later sold at service stations like Shell and Texaco? If you do, then you remember pulling over to the side of the road (hopefully), unfolding the map to its full 4’ X 4’ size and then trying to find out if you were still on the right path to your destination.

But, before you could determine the best route to your journey’s end, you needed to do a little detective work. I call this part of the process the, “Where the *$@% are we?” activity. You see, you can’t go from here to there, without knowing where “here” is. Even the smartest person on earth couldn’t map you a route without having a specific starting point.

The same is true with overpowering fear. Unless you can recognize and accept the things you fear, you’ll never be able overpower them and remove these obstacles from your life.

Now you’re probably thinking why would I not know my own fears? And that’s a very good question. The answer is actually quite simple. Many of your fears have been with you for a lifetime. Over that many years of fighting a fear you have created “work arounds” to avoid facing that particular fear. A work around is just something you’ve created to sidestep the fear. As an example: Let’s say you hate going to parties where you hardly know anyone. You’re uncomfortable when meeting new people. The thought of making small talk terrifies you. You don’t have confidence that you can carry on an intelligent conversation, believing that you’re not that smart or well read.

So, when invited, you casually ask the hostess who else will be attending. She responds, “Oh, mostly my husband’s friends from work. But they’re a great group.” The first thing you do is feel the old fear. But that quickly dissipates when you respond with your work around, “Oh, the parties a week from Saturday. I’m sorry, I’ve already committed myself to babysitting my niece. But keep me in mind for the next one.” You have done this so many times in the past that you probably don’t even recognize that you’re doing it.

In overpowering any fear the first step is acknowledging that you experience it. Once you accept that you do suffer from this fear you can now use my techniques for facing and overpowering it. Exercise 1 in my book Overpowering Fear – Defeating the #1 Challenge in Sales and Life gives you the tools you need to identify the fears you experience.

OK, you want to know now. I hear you. Here’s what you do: Go into a quiet room with a legal pad and a pen. Make yourself comfortable. Ask your higher power to guide you in identifying the fears in your life (you may have to do this several times). Now wait. Soon a fear will pop into your mind. Write it down. Soon another and then another. Don’t prejudge anything. You’ll know when you’re finished. Then prioritize your fears from the ones you experience the most down to the least. Now start with the first one, walk up to it, face it and just overpower it.

Love,

Michael

People Who Rain on Our Parade

Have you ever had a great idea: for a new product, a new job, a new business, or even a move to another locale? You’re excited about whatever you have chosen, and can’t wait to share it with others.

And so you tell a friend or a family member and instead of getting a positive response that will reinforce your decision you get something like this. “What makes you think you can start a business? Don’t you know we’re in a recession? It takes a long time to get a business off the ground. You tried that once and you failed miserably.” “You want a new car? Can you afford it? Remember you’ve only been on your job 6 months.” “This is who you chose for a spouse? You can do much better than this. Why rush?”

What did it feel like when you heard those comments? I’ll bet they were painful. And I’ll bet even more that they made you feel lost, confused and fearful.

You started doubting yourself and your new idea. Then you probably said to yourself maybe it wasn’t such a good idea after all.

Why do people do this? When asked, most naysayers will tell you that they just want to help. That they want to prevent you from making a mistake. So they feel this compulsion to point out your past follies, mistakes and failures.

And if you challenge them they’ll usually reply with, “You’re just not being realistic!”

Bull. What’s really being said is, “I’m jealous. If you succeed you probably won’t be friends with me anymore. You’ll move out of the neighborhood and won’t ever come back. Your success will make me feel like a failure. My life will be ruined.”

So the next time you’ve got a great idea and someone rains on your parade, instead of feeling fear, take a good hard look at the person telling you these negative things. Then ask yourself, “Is this someone whose advice I value?” If the answer is no get away from them as quickly as possible. They’ll just bring you down.

Love,

Michael

Don’t Let Anybody Bully You!

Luckman’s Law: Don’t let anybody bully you, including your own ego.

The funny thing about this Luckman’s Law is that for most, we still allow others to bully us. It could be a boss, your co-workers, your customers or maybe even your spouse.

Nobody should be a bully and nobody should allow others to bully them.

The best response that I’ve found when confronted by a bully is to fight back. I’m not talking about swinging a right hook. I’m talking about standing up to the bully and let them know you aren’t going to stand there and take their crap. Most bullies depend upon their victim to cower in fear, and that’s because most do. But your average bully doesn’t expect you to respond in such a drastic fashion. And when confronted, typically backs down.

Now, let’s talk about a more insidious bully. Your ego. You see, my belief is that your ego is not your friend. Never has been and never will be. Your ego is there simply to compare you and your possessions to others. When you compare favorably you feel good. On top of the world. Ready to conquer any challenge. But when you are compared unfavorably, when you don’t measure up, the first emotion you feel is fear. Fear that you’re not good enough, rich enough, talented enough, deserving enough or whatever. When the fear comes your confidence goes. You feel uncertain and begin to doubt yourself, your talents and your abilities. And then, when your confidence disappears, expect your self-esteem to follow.

Your ego uses your voice to tell you things that others have said, and lead you to believe were true about yourself. But the majority of what your little voice tells you are lies. Someone in your distant past, when you were too young to argue, planted the seed that you were in some way inferior to others, perhaps even defective. You accepted it because you thought it was the truth. Now I’m telling you, it’s not.

The bad news is that you probably have a strong ego that gains pleasure in putting you down. The good news is you can eliminate your ego. A Course in Miracles discusses this in great detail, but it really is just a matter of refusing to listen to your ego. When that little voice starts talking to you you have a choice. You can listen and let its words take hold in your conscious mind and feel fear, or you can say to your ego, thanks for the advice, but no thanks. And let those negative thoughts disappear. It may take some time for your ego to finally listen to you. So, never never give up.

Love,

Michael

Doubt is Negative Thinking

Doubt is negative thinking and your subconscious mind will take your worrisome and doubtful images and will accept them just as quickly and as willingly as it will your images of prosperity. ~Another Born Rich Affirmation

The amazing thing about the subconscious mind is that it cannot differentiate between what is real and what is not real. We have all heard stories about famous athletes who create a picture in their mind of how they want their body to perform. Then they just go ahead and do it precisely as they imagined it. It becomes like second nature to them

This gift is not exclusive to athletes or for that matter rich people. It has been given to each of us to use or not use as we see fit.

To hasten the flow of all the good things you want to enter your life, you need to use your subconscious mind to its fullest extent. And to do this, you need to provide your subconscious mind with detailed pictures of what you want to come into existence. And here lies the problem.

Our minds generate upwards of 60,000 thoughts in a day, and better than 90% of those thoughts are negative. So it stands to reason that our subconscious minds generate more negative things in our lives than positive things. But it doesn’t have to be that way. We each have the power to change this.

That’s true. We have this innate power to change our thoughts and thus change our lives. Want to hit that perfect drive right down the middle of the fairway? Create a picture in your mind of doing just that. Add all the detail necessary to create your scenario. Want to get an “A” on your next exam? See yourself taking the test effortlessly with every answer coming with the question. See the test returned to you with an “A” at the top next to your name. Want to give the perfect presentation? In your mind see yourself walking through your presentation with perfect accuracy. And when you actually do it your subconscious mind will follow the script exactly as you wrote it.

Remember, you’re the writer, producer and director of each and every scenario you create in your mind. So don’t forget, you’re creating an Academy Award production. Don’t skimp on the details and short change yourself.

All successful people use their subconscious minds to create prosperity. You can do it too.

Love,

Michael