Opportunity and fear…

Time to Go Big…

Fear was on my mind on my walk today, I was thinking about a coaching client of mine.

She is faced with an opportunity right now and when it was brought to her she was immediately hit with fear.

On our call today, she told me all of the wild thoughts that threw themselves at her at warp speed when she first got the call with this opportunity.

Before I share her thoughts with you (and yes, she gave me approval to do so) I feel it’s important to know that there is NO MONEY at stake, there are NO CONTRACTS being signed, DEATH could not be a result, hell INJURY isn’t even a possibility.

Back to her attacking thoughts…these are the primary thoughts that hurled themselves at her…

• ‘What if it only seems like an opportunity but it’s not?’
• ‘What if it’s too much work and doesn’t fit into my life how I want it to?”
• “What if I hate it?”
• “What if it fails?”
• “What if I waste my time?’

…You get the idea.

Fear is such a huge factor in our lives…it becomes a great reason NOT to do things, get involved, connect, try…live.

The funny thing to me is how we phrase our fears…here are some examples of what we tell ourselves…

• ‘I’m scared to fly’
  (No you’re not…you’re scared to die)
• ‘I’m scared to love’
  (No you’re not…you’re scared that you won’t be loved back)
• ‘I’m scared to try a new sport, language, hobby, business.’
  (No you’re not your scared you’ll look stupid)
• ‘I’m scared to start my own business.’
  (No you’re not…you’re scared you’ll fail)
• ‘I’m scared to reach out to that casting director’
  (No you’re not…you’re scared they’ll tell you you’re not talented)
• ‘I’m scared to tell them how much I love them’
  (No you’re not…you’re scared they won’t care)
• ‘I’m scared to commit to __________.’
  (No you’re not, you’re scared if you commit you lose the power to choose)

And the list goes on…

We attach fear to the wrong thing…we attach it to the action when really what we are scared of is some potential negative feeling/emotion/result.

If we took EVERYTHING that anyone claims they are scared of I guarantee it boils down to a few basic fears:

• Fear of death or injury (to you or someone you love).
• Fear of rejection
• Fear of looking stupid
• Fear of failure

Boiled down even further…what we are scared of in one word is PAIN.

And the thing about people is, for the most part, we will most likely take action to avoid PAIN than we will to achieve pleasure.

BUT BUT BUT

Isn’t living life in a LESS THAN way PAINFUL?

It is for me…it sucks…I hate it…I wish I got zapped with electricity every time I chose the pain of safety over the possibility of pain with something new or out of the box that could bring me great joy.

That’s what I mean by ‘Go Big’…to me ‘Going Big’ means choosing to go toward what has a chance to bring me great joy even though it may not…because if I don’t ‘Go Big’ I am guaranteed 1 thing and 1 thing only, and that is the pain of living a life that is ‘less than’.

So my questions for you today are:

What does ‘Go Big’ mean to you?

Remember the Go Big End of Year Challenge: In what small way (maybe in less than 15 minutes) can you push your comfort zone and choose to ‘Go Big’ today?

Go Big!

Kristen

P.S. My Go Big VIP Program is filling up and I am doing something special.  The next 50 people that join and commit to ‘Go Big Now’ and not wait until after the holidays will get a special 1-on-1 strategy session with me in January to give you that extra advantage you need to make 2010 the best it can be. Get on board as one of the next 50 here: http://www.gobigcoach.com/gobignow