Change Your Thinking, Change Your Life: How to Unlock Your Full Potential for Success and Achievement (36 page)

Many of the problems in our society would not exist if this test were applied regularly in debates over public and social policy. Governments would be slower to approve certain actions in the areas of crime, education, welfare, and business if there was a likelihood that everyone would engage in those actions.

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SET HIGH STANDARDS FOR YOURSELF

Here are some questions that you can ask yourself on a regular basis: First, ask yourself,
“What kind of a world would my world be if everyone
in it were just like me?”
Just imagine! If everyone in the world were just like you, would this be a better world in which to live? If everyone in the world were just like you, would this be a happier, healthier, more prosperous, and more harmonious world—or not?

Then, ask yourself,
“What kind of a country would my country
be if everyone in it were just like me?”
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everyone did the things that you do in your daily life and work, would this be a better country? Or are there some things that you might do differently?

The third question you can ask yourself is,
“What kind of a company would my company be if everyone in it were just like me?”
Look around you in your company and ask yourself if your company would be more prosperous and harmonious if everybody in it did their work exactly the way you do your work all day long.

The final question that you can ask yourself is,
“What kind of a
family would my family be if everyone in it was just like me?”
If all the members of your family were just like you, would your family be a wonderful place to live and grow up in? Would everybody in your family thrive and be happier and more successful?

Would you have the kind of family that other people would point to and admire and want to be like?

The fact is that no one can answer “yes” to all of these questions. Each of us is a
work in progress
. Each of us has a long way go.

Each of us has a lot of room for improvement.

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THE QUALITY OF COURAGE

In a review of 3,300 studies of leadership conducted by James McPherson over the years, he found a common denominator.

It was the quality of courage. Winston Churchill once said,

“Courage is rightly considered the foremost of the virtues, for upon it,
all others depend.”

You have heard it said that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. The world is full of people with high and lofty goals and ambitions, but there are very few people who have the courage, the discipline, and the willpower to carry them out.

The best part of practicing the quality of courage is that each time you behave courageously, you feel stronger and better about yourself. Your self-esteem increases and you like yourself more. You feel more confident and competent.You feel happier inside.

In contrast, each time you compromise yourself in the area of courage your self-esteem goes down. You feel weaker and less competent.You don’t like or respect yourself as much.

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DO THE THING YOU FEAR

A fundamental part of becoming personally powerful requires that you live consistently with the highest values you know, in every area of your life. These virtues and values not only are self-reinforcing, they also are self-rewarding. You get an immediate payoff of inner satisfaction each time you force yourself to do what you know you should do, even when you don’t feel like it.

The fear of failure is the greatest single obstacle to success in adult life. The antidote to the fear of failure is the courage to take action. Courage is so important as a quality that, like physical fitness, it requires a series of exercises to build it and maintain it.

You best way to develop courage is by facing your fears. Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote,
“Do the thing you fear, and the death of fear
is certain.”

When you do the thing that you are afraid of, you take control over both your emotions and your life. You shift your attitude from neutral or negative to positive and optimistic. “Do the thing you fear, and the death of fear is certain.”

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PRACTICE SYSTEMATIC

DESENSITIZATION

Many people fear public speaking. But Toastmasters International has developed a powerful method of teaching public speaking even to people who are absolutely terrified of the idea of standing up and speaking in front of others. It is the process of “systematic desensitization.” You can use it in every area of your life to reduce fear and build courage.

Systematic desensitization is a psychological term that refers to your doing something over and over again until it no longer holds any fear for you. In Toastmasters International, each member is required to stand up and speak, even if just for a few seconds, at every meeting. After several months of weekly meetings, people who were so terrified of speaking in front of others that they could not lead silent prayer in a phone booth become so confident about their ability to stand up and speak in front of peers that they compete for longer opportunities to talk.

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SPEAK ON YOUR FEET

I have worked with countless executives who have taken my advice and joined Toastmasters International or taken a course from the Dale Carnegie organization. Within six months, they tell me that they are completely different people. From being shy and self-effacing at meetings and in presentations, they become calm, confident, bold, and even eloquent in expressing their points on their feet with other people. And their careers take off as well.

When you can speak on your feet, you appear to be smarter and more competent than a person who cannot. Many executives, both men and women, have seen their careers take off, their incomes increase, and their responsibilities expand as they faced their fears by speaking over and over again and until they became very good on their feet.

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TURN TOWARD DANGER

On the Serengeti Plain of Africa, zoologists have developed a simple technique to determine which one of the animals in the herd is the leader.

When a predator—a lion or cheetah—approaches a herd of grazing animals, the members of the herd pick up the scent in the wind and begin drifting away in the opposite direction. At this time, the leader of the herd will emerge. The leader will be the animal that places himself between the predator and the herd while the herd begins to flee. The leader, risking his life facing the lion or cheetah that is moving in on the herd, will nonetheless stand his ground to buy time for the others to escape.

The leader always “turns toward danger.” This is as true for human beings as it is for animals. You become a leader to the degree to which you force yourself to turn toward danger as well. You identify the areas in your life that cause you fear and stress, and instead of avoiding them and hoping that they will go away, you confront them directly.

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DO IT ANYWAY

The actor Glenn Ford once said,
“If you do not do the thing you fear,
the fear controls your life.”

It is almost as if the fear is the puppeteer and you are the puppet. If you don’t deal with the fear,and cut the strings that hold you to the fear, the fear will cause you to dance emotionally and psychologically. If you let a fear go on for too long, it will tend to grow and grow and eventually come to dominate all of your thinking.

Each time you think of the fearful situation or person, your heart will beat faster and your stomach will churn. You will be unable to sleep well at night. The fear will affect your health, your happiness, your relationships, and your interactions with your customers and co-workers. Over time, you will become so preoccupied with the fear-inducing situation that you will not be able to think of anything else.

This is no way to live.

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FACE THE FEAR

The way you deal with fear is to confront the fear. You resolve to face the fear, deal with the fear, and put an end to the fear.

When I was a young man and confronted with a fearful situation, I read a quote from Mark Twain that changed my attitude forever. It said,
“Courage is not lack of fear or absence of fear. It is mastery
of fear, control of fear.”

Those words had an enormous impact on me. I realized that we are all afraid of many things. To be afraid is normal and natural. In fact, the more intelligent you are, the greater number of possible fears you will have. You will have a greater sensitivity to your world and to the things it is logical for you to fear.

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MOVE TOWARD THE FEAR

The only difference between the brave person and the coward is that the brave person confronts the fear and deals with it while the coward turns from the fear and flees from it.

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over you. But if you back away from a fear, it grows larger and soon takes control of your thoughts and feelings.

When you habitually turn toward danger, do the thing you fear, face the fear, and move toward it bravely, it loses its power to affect you. Soon you dominate the fear rather than having it dominate you. You feel a tremendous sense of control. The quality that you need to face your fears, more than anything else, is the quality of self-discipline.

Wonderfully enough, when you discipline yourself to face your fears, to act courageously, even when you don’t feel like it, your fear situation goes away. You will feel terrific about yourself. You will have a sense of power and control over your life.

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LEAP AND THE NET WILL APPEAR

The first part of courage is the courage to launch in the direction of your goal. It is the ability and willingness for you to set a goal and then take the first step in the direction of achieving it.

In a 12-year study at Babson College, entrepreneurial instructor Dr. Robert Ronstadt searched for the reasons for success or failure among the graduates of the business school. Some went on to build successful businesses, but most did not. He discovered that those who built successful businesses had a special quality. It was that they had the courage to launch their businesses with
no guarantees
of success. They were willing to risk failure in the pursuit of their dreams.

Professor Ronstadt called this the “corridor principle.” He said that when you launch toward your goal, however distant, you begin to move down a corridor of time. As you move down this corridor, other doors of opportunity will open up on either side of you. But you would not have been able to see these other doors of opportunity if you were not already in motion down this psychological corridor toward your goal.

Most people who succeed in life achieve their success in an area completely different from the field in which they started off. But because they were in motion, they saw opportunities and possibilities that they would not have been aware of if they had waited until everything was just right. And the fact is that everything will never be just right.

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THE IRON QUALITY OF SUCCESS

If the first part of courage is the willingness to
begin
; the second part of courage is the willingness to
endure
. It is the courage to hang in there. It is the courage to stay the course. It is the courage to persist in the face of every setback and difficulty.

Self-discipline is the iron quality of character. It is what enables you to endure. Self-discipline is the one quality that gives you the strength that you need to take risks and to move forward in the face of danger and uncertainty. It is self-discipline, and the courage that comes from self-discipline, that develops personal power within you that enables you to overcome any obstacle in your way.

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DIFFERENT FORMS OF COURAGE

There are several forms of courage that you can develop with practice. These forms of courage will help you to achieve the great success that is possible for you. They are all learnable with practice.

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Dream Big Dreams

The first form of courage is the courage to dream big dreams and to set big goals. This is where most people are stopped. The very idea of setting big, challenging, exciting, worthwhile goals is so overwhelming that they quit before they even begin. But this is not for you. Sit down, write out your goals as if anything were possible for you, and never be afraid to dream big dreams.

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Make a Commitment

The second type of courage is the courage to make a total commitment, throwing yourself wholeheartedly into whatever it is you decide to do. All successful people of my experience are people who are living fully engaged. They are fully involved in their lives and in their goals. They don’t do things by half measures. They may have no guarantees, but they are not afraid to put their whole hearts into their activities. If they fail, they fail by trying greatly, not by playing it safe, wishing and hoping that everything will work out all right.

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Move out of Your Comfort Zone

The third type of courage you need is the courage to move out of your comfort zone. It is the courage to move into your zone of
discomfort
, where you feel awkward, clumsy, and alone. The comfort zone is one of the greatest enemies of human potential. When people get into a comfort zone, they strive to stay in that comfort zone.