No Excuses!: The Power of Self-Discipline (15 page)

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Authors: Brian Tracy

Tags: #Self Help, #Business, #Non-Fiction, #Psychology, #Inspirational

BOOK: No Excuses!: The Power of Self-Discipline
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Learn to Speak on Your Feet
 
In 1923, Toastmasters International was formed. Its express purpose was to take people who were terrified of public speaking and help them to become confident and competent when speaking on their feet in front of an audience.
 
According to
The Book of Lists
, 54 percent of adults rate the fear of public speaking ahead of the fear of death. But Toastmasters International had a solution. They created a system based on what psychologists call “systematic desensitization.”
 
Once a week, at a luncheon or dinner meeting, small groups of Toastmasters come together. Each person is required to stand up and give a short talk on a specified subject in front of a group of his peers. At the end of each talk, the speaker receives applause, positive input, and comments from the other members. At the end of the evening, each person is given a grade on his talk, even if it was only for thirty or sixty seconds.
 
After six months of attending Toastmaster’s meetings, the individual will have stood on his feet and spoken twenty-six times, receiving positive applause and feedback each time. Because of this continuous positive reinforcement, his confidence increases dramatically. As a result of this process, countless Toastmasters have gone on to become excellent public speakers and prominent people in their businesses, organizations, and communities. Their fears of public speaking are gone forever.
 
Eliminate Two Fears at Once
 
Psychologists have found that certain fears are bundled together in the subconscious mind, like wires on the same circuit. If you can overcome your fears in one of these areas, you will also eliminate other fears on the same circuit.
 
The fear of rejection, or call reluctance, seems to be bundled together with the fear of public speaking. When you discipline yourself to join Toastmasters or take a Dale Carnegie course to learn to speak confidently on your feet, your fears of rejection disappear as well. Your level of self-confidence in all your interactions with others increases dramatically. Your whole life changes in a positive way.
 
Confront Your Fears
 
Your ability to confront, deal with, and act in spite of your fears is the key to happiness and success. One of the best exercises you can practice is to identify a person or situation in your life of which you are afraid and resolve to deal with that fear situation immediately. Do not allow it to make you unhappy for another minute. Resolve to confront the situation or person and put the fear behind you.
 
A woman in one of my seminars told me that her boss was a very negative person. He was constantly criticizing and berating her about her work, even though she was one of the highest-rated employees in the organization. He was making her life miserable. She didn’t want to give up her job, but she was afraid of confronting him. She asked me what she should do.
 
I gave her this advice, which I have subsequently given to many other people: The only reason that one person bullies another is he feels he can get away with it. The only way to deal with a bully is to confront him. Bullies are actually cowards at heart, and they will flee from a confrontation.
 
I told her to do this: The next time your boss criticizes you for any reason, turn to him and say, quite firmly, “I would appreciate if you not talk to me like that ever again. It hurts my feelings and stops me from doing my job the way you want.”
 
I told her to look him straight in the eye after she had finished making this statement. She had tremendous courage. Rather than putting up with this situation any longer, the next time her boss began to berate her, she squared off with him and said those words.
 
She wrote to me and told me what had happened. Just as I had predicted, he stopped dead in his tracks. He immediately apologized and mumbled and then quickly went back to his office. He never criticized her again. She told me that she could have ended his bad treatment of her many months before if she had only had the courage to confront him directly the first time it happened.
 
As Eleanor Roosevelt said, “No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.”
 
 
Move Toward the Fear
 
When you identify a fear and discipline yourself to move toward it, it grows smaller and more manageable. What’s more, as your fears grow smaller, your confidence grows. Soon, your fears lose their control over you.
 
In contrast, when you back away from a fear-inducing situation or person, your fear grows
larger
and
larger
. Soon it dominates your thinking and feeling, preoccupies you during the day, and often keeps you awake at night.
 
Leaders Have Two Types of Courage
 
In leadership, the most common quality is that of
vision
. Leaders have a clear vision of where they want to take their organizations. Leaders also have a clear vision of where they want to be sometime in the future in their personal lives.
 
The second most common quality of leaders is that of courage. Leaders have the courage to do whatever is necessary to fulfill their vision. They lead from the front and dare to go forward.
 
There are two types of courage that you need:
 
First, you need the courage to
launch,
to
take action
, to take a leap of faith. You need the courage to go “all in” without any guarantee of success and with a high possibility of failure, at least in the short term. The major failing that holds most people back is that in spite of all their best intentions, they don’t have the courage to take the first step.
 
The second type of courage that you need is called “courageous patience.” This is the ability to hang in there and continue working and fighting after you have gone all in and before you have yet seen any results or rewards. Many people can muster up the courage to take action toward a new goal, but when they see no immediate result they quickly lose heart and pull back to safety and security. They don’t have
staying power.
 
Deal With the Fear Directly
 
The only way to deal with a fear is to address it head-on. Remind yourself that “denial” is not a river in Egypt. The natural tendency of many people is to deny that they have a problem caused by fear of some kind. They’re afraid of confronting it. In turn, it becomes a major source of stress, unhappiness, and psychosomatic illness.
 
Be willing to deal with the situation or person directly. As Shakespeare said, “Take arms against a sea of troubles, and in so doing, end them.”
 
The companion of fear is
worry
. Like twin sisters, fear and worry go around together. Mark Twain once wrote, “I have worried about a lot of things in life, and most of them never happened.”
 
It has been estimated that 99 percent of the things that you worry about never happen. And most of the things that do happen, happen so quickly that you didn’t have time to worry about them in the first place.
 
The Disaster Report
 
Whenever you are worried about something, fill out a “Disaster Report” on the situation. This will destroy your fear and worry almost instantly. This is often called the “worry buster.” The Disaster Report has four parts:
•
First, Define the Worry Situation Clearly.
What exactly are you worried about? Very often, when you take the time to be completely clear about the worry situation, a way to resolve the situation becomes immediately evident.
•
Second, Identify the Worst Possible Thing That Could Possibly Happen
if this worry situation were to take place. Would you lose your job? Would you lose your relationship? Would you lose your money? What is the worst thing that could possibly happen? Be clear about this. In many cases, you will see that should the worst occur, it would not ruin you. It might be inconvenient or uncomfortable, but you would eventually recover. You will find that it’s probably not worth all the worry that you are devoting to it.
•
Third, Resolve to Accept the Worst Possible Outcome,
should it occur. Say to yourself, “Well, if that happens, it won’t kill me. I will find a way to get along.” Most of the stress of worry comes from denial, from not being willing to face the worst possible thing that could happen. But once you have resolved to accept the worst (should it occur), all the worry and stress seem to disappear.
•
Fourth, Begin Immediately to Improve on the Worst.
Take every step that you possibly can to make sure that the worst possible outcome does not occur. Take action immediately. Do something. Get on with it. Act quickly. Get so busy making sure that the worst thing does not happen that you have no time to worry.
 
The Real Antidote
 
In the final analysis, the only real cure for fear or worry is
disciplined, purposeful action in the direction of your goals.
Get so busy working on your goals or the solutions to your problems that you have no time to be afraid or to worry about anything.
 
When you practice the self-discipline of courage and force yourself to face any fear-inducing situation in your life, your self-esteem goes up, your self-respect increases, and your sense of personal pride grows. You eventually reach the point in life where you are not afraid of
anything.
 
Once you have developed the courage to step out in faith, you must then develop the self-discipline of
persistence
, which we will talk about in the next chapter.
 
 
Action Exercises:
 
1. Identify your three biggest fears in life, right now. What are they?
2. Determine what you would do in each of these situations if you were guaranteed of complete success. What actions would you take?
3. What have you always wanted to do but been afraid to attempt? What would you do differently if you were guaranteed success?
4. In what three areas of life and work do you most experience the fears of failure and loss? What steps could you take immediately to confront and eliminate those fears?
5. In what three areas of life do you most experience the fears of criticism, rejection, or embarrassment? How could you confront these fears and overcome them?
6. What one great goal would you set for yourself if you knew you could not fail?
7. What would you do differently in life if you had $20 million in the bank, but only ten years left to live?
 
 
Chapter 7
 
Self-Discipline and Persistence
 
“Beware of endeavoring to become a great man in a hurry.
One such attempt in 10,000 may succeed.
These are fearful odds.”
—BENJAMIN DISRAELI
 
 
 
 
P
ersistence is self-discipline in action. Your ability to persist in the face of all setbacks and temporary failures is essential to success in life.
 
Napoleon Hill said, “Persistence is to the character of man as carbon is to steel.” The primary reason for success is persistence, and, likewise, the primary reason for failure is lack of persistence, quitting too soon.
 
There is a direct link between self-discipline and self-esteem. Each time you discipline yourself to do what you should do, when you should do it, whether you feel like it or not, your self-esteem increases. This why there is direct relationship between self-esteem and persistence. Each time you persist and force yourself to continue on, even when you feel like quitting, your self-esteem goes up.
 
Each act of self-discipline strengthens every other act of self-discipline. Every act of persistence strengthens every other act of persistence. When you discipline yourself to persist, over and over, you like and respect yourself more and more. You become stronger and more confident. Eventually, you become
unstoppable
.

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