The School of Greatness - 348 The Key to Overcoming Your Fear

Episode Date: July 1, 2016

“In any moment of decision, the best thing you can do is the right thing. The next best thing is the wrong thing. The worst thing you can do is nothing.” – Theodore Roosevelt If you enjoyed this episode, check out show notes and more at http://lewishowes.com/348

Episode number 348, 5-Minute Friday, and it's time to take action. So I was doing a mastermind call the other night with a group of incredible entrepreneurial-minded individuals, and I was doing a Q&A for about an hour and a half, and I was kind of in the flow. I was in the zone, And I really enjoyed this call. For whatever reason, the energy, the facilitator, I just really enjoyed and appreciated what they were up to. And they meet once a week on a video chat. And they're talking about their goals and teaching and learning and growing. And I just loved it. One of the questions, one of the ladies was asking me, you know, she's just starting out

in this business. She's got her own job. She's got a couple of kids. She's a single mom. She's working hard. But it doesn't seem like there's not much time in the day. It doesn't seem like there's that much opportunity to grow and achieve this big dream that she has for her business. And she's got this big dream. And she's like, you know, how long is it going to take for me to get to where I want to be? Like, is it going to take a long time? How long did it take you? And I said, you know, it took me essentially eight years from my journey when I first started out after playing arena football and sleeping on my sister's couch and not really

knowing what I was going to do for the rest of my life. Didn't have a college degree yet. not really knowing what I was going to do for the rest of my life. Didn't have a college degree yet. Didn't have any business experience. Never made a dime except for working as a truck driver. Believe it or not, I worked as a truck driver six hours a day from Columbus, Ohio to Cincinnati and back every single day driving Napa car auto parts. And I was also a bouncer on the weekends at a club near where I was living, and just trying to make a little bit of cash here and there. But I never really worked on my own. Maybe the most entrepreneurial thing I ever did was mow my neighbor's lawn. That's about it. But I didn't understand how to generate income. I didn't understand how to build a business or build a brand. I knew nothing

about this about eight years ago on my journey. And she was like, how long is it going to take me to get to where I want to be? And I said, listen, it took me about eight years to get to this place where I'm at a place where I feel like I'm just starting to scratch the surface. I feel like I'm still just getting started. And compared to the Mark Cubans and the Elon Musk of the world, I'm, you know, I'm like, barely doing anything. I'm like, pennies, I'm just like, barely scratching the surface. So I feel like I'm still, you know, learning and growing and, and creating, you know, I still have a seven figure business. And you know, things are amazing and incredible.

And I'm very grateful for what I've created and what my team and I are doing to make an impact on the world. But it's taken me time. And here is the thing that almost crippled me for a while. You know, for a while on my sister's couch, this almost crippled me. And I'm going to read a quote by Theodore Roosevelt. crippled me. And I'm going to read a quote by Theodore Roosevelt. It said, in any moment of decision, the best thing you can do is the right thing. The next best thing is the wrong thing. The worst thing you can do is nothing. And I remember feeling overwhelmed. And if you're feeling overwhelmed right now, just go ahead and nod to yourself. Just go ahead and nod and say, yes, I'm feeling overwhelmed. It's okay to acknowledge it. We can

acknowledge and accept where we're at in our lives right now, but we don't have to let it consume us and keep us down. We can feel overwhelmed for a moment, but then we get to move through it and create some momentum and take action. And the challenge is when we feel overwhelmed or when we feel like, here's another thing, we feel like we have too many ideas. We don't know which idea to take action on. You know, I want to do this project and I've got this book to write and this podcast and I want to speak and I want to create this business and this mobile app I want to do and I want to do this. You know, nod if you're the person that wants to do everything. If you've

got so many ideas and you don't know which one to take action on. I've been there as well. The challenge is we can feel stuck. We can feel almost paralyzed by the fear of I'm never going to get to my big dream. And I'm so overwhelmed as it is right now. You know, I've got this responsibility and these kids and family and I'm going through a divorce and I don't have the time. There's no free time for myself to even take care of my health.

I get it. I get it. And I want you to take a big, deep breath and just take a moment to realize that you've created so much in your life already. You get to acknowledge and recognize all the good you have done. Even if you don't feel like you've done that much, you get to acknowledge and take a moment right now to say, you know what, I've done a lot of good things,

and really create a mental list or even write it down. What are all the things that you have created up until this point? And then you get to take another deep breath and relax for a moment and realize that all of this is fear. Fear is holding you back from going after your dreams. You know, there's another great quote by Gabriel Garcia Marquez that says, it is not true that people stop pursuing dreams because they grow old. They grow old because they stop pursuing dreams. And we get overwhelmed and we grow old because we are feeling like, you know, we can't create anything. We're paralyzed in decision. We're paralyzed by the fear of what could go wrong. What happens if I failed and all my friends laugh at me? What

happens if I succeed and my friends try to hold me down or that now I have some new responsibility I'm not ready for? What happens if I look bad in the process? I don't know what I'm doing. I don't know which action to take. In any moment of decision, the best thing you can do is do the right thing. The next best thing is the wrong decision, the best thing you can do is do the right thing. The next best thing is the wrong thing. The worst thing you can do is nothing, nothing. So when you feel paralyzed, when you feel fear, when you feel overwhelmed, you get to take a deep breath and connect to your vision. What is it you really want? And why do you want that thing? What is that dream inside of you? Are you going to pursue it and stay young? Are you going to stop pursuing your dream and start to grow old really fast? And you're going to allow fear and depression and confusion and overwhelm

to hold you back from pursuing that dream. Who cares if you fail? What's the worst that could happen if you fail? Who cares what you look like? Are you really going to let your ego stand in the way of making mistakes? You're going to look silly from time to time. Who cares? Are you going to let that hold you back from achieving and creating and inspiring and solving problems and creating beautiful families and bringing communities together? Are you going to let your silly little ego and fear of looking bad hold you back? Heck no. It's time to take action. It's time to move one step. All you got to do is one action step each day towards that dream. You don't have to say, okay, I have nothing right now and I need

to make a million dollars in a week, otherwise I'm a failure. It took me seven, eight years to get to the place where I feel like I'm scratching the surface and just getting started. And I have a long way to go. But every single day I showed up, every single day I worked hard. And yes, I made mistakes. And yes, there were times where I worked too hard and my health got out of sync. So I had to readjust. I had to reevaluate. I had to get back in balance with my health. You know, there was times where my relationships went out of whack. So I got to acknowledge and realize, okay, I'm working too hard and I get to put time and energy into this thing. You get to ebb and flow with the season of your life

of where you're at right now. And the most important thing you can do is take one action step today. One action step right now that is moving you towards your goals, moving you towards a better life, moving you towards health, moving you towards fulfillment, joy, moving you towards contribution, and moving you towards your dreams. The biggest thing you can do is take action right now. This is 5-Minute Friday, episode number 348. If you enjoyed this episode, make sure to subscribe to our podcast on iTunes. You just click on your podcast app and click the subscribe button,

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