What’s holding you back from doing the thing you’ve always wanted to do?
Is there something that would make you unfathomably proud and happy if you gave it a go?
I must confess that I let myself down all the time by not following through with some of my creative ideas.
Ideas that would make me happy, or proud, or change my life for the better.
And this means there are quite a few things in life I regret not doing.
The reason I brought this up is because earlier this week I had a conversation with a good friend about how they wanted to create more online content for their business but felt they couldn't because they’re scared to put themselves out there.
They have a subconscious fear of failure, a fear of opening up, or fear that they’ll look stupid. And this struck a chord with me, big time.
You know why? Because I come across these fears almost daily.
Although I often feel these fears, not feeling confident and being scared to do something is pretty tricky for me. I’ve always considered myself a confident person and someone that’s unafraid to put myself out there.
But for some reason I still fail to do things I really want to do.
These fears are commonly referred to as limiting beliefs.
The concept of limiting beliefs has been discussed by almost every self-help expert in history from Tony Robbins and Brene Brown, to Mark Manson and Steven Bartlett.
Limiting beliefs are a recurring theme I keep coming across as a people pleaser. The amount of fake scenarios I play out in my head, both positive and negative, that end up stopping me from doing something is ridiculous.
I can say with absolute certainty that I’ve not even attempted to pursue something I’ve really wanted to do before because my fear driven people pleasing has held me back.
And whatever it was I wanted to do faded away into yet another dead dream and wasted potential.
Things like starting a business, or releasing a new song, or posting a new video on instagram.
But as this is a blog about overcoming people pleasing, I want to figure out how to win against these limiting beliefs. And the first step towards that is identifying and understanding what they are.
The 3 limiting beliefs that make up the fear-procrastination cycle
People pleasing tendencies rooted in fear can significantly impact our ability to manage time effectively, leading to procrastination.
And procrastination leads to staying in our comfort zones and never really doing the things we want to do.
This fear based procrastination happens because as people pleasers we want to delay difficult tasks to avoid potential negative outcomes - which most of the time won’t actually happen.
There are 3x main fears that contribute to the fear-procrastination cycle for people pleasers:
Fear of failure, fear of conflict and fear of judgement.
In essence, these are all limiting beliefs.
Limiting belief - Fear of failure
“I’m not very good at this so it’s probably not going to work” - This fear can hold us back from ever starting anything because we convince ourselves that whatever it is we’re trying to do won’t work, so why even bother.
Limiting belief - Fear of conflict
“I can't ask for help because I’ll be a burden to others” - This fear stops us from having difficult conversations or asking for help, which is essential when you’re starting something new, because we don’t want to be a bother to others.
Limiting belief - Fear of judgement
“People will think I’m stupid and probably hate it” - this fear stops us putting ourselves out there because we’re scared to receive negative feedback or get rejected by our peers.
Now if I can just get these 3 fears under control, I’ll be well on my way to overcoming this fear-based procrastination!
Great ideas without action are just wasted potential
Just like the friend I mentioned earlier, something that I was recently afraid to do was post my face on the Confessions Of A Recovering People Pleaser instagram.
In my mind I had some great ideas for bite size people pleasing videos that hopefully more people could relate to.
But I was stuck.
Something inside me was holding me back from posting the videos.
I went through a myriad of excuses from “I need to get my scripts right”, “I’ll wait until I’ve done a bit more research”, “I just need to order a tripod for my phone so I don’t need to hold it to record myself”.
All of these were fear based excuses that were masking the real questions I was asking myself:
“What if no one watches?”, “What if someone sees it and hates it?” and “What if it’s not the right time to do this?”.
These questions are manifestations of the limiting beliefs we spoke about earlier: Fear of failure, fear of conflict and fear of judgement.
Deep down I’m just afraid I might get some negative feedback, or it won’t work or people will think I’m stupid.
Was this just going to be another great idea wasted? I decided no, I wanted to actually follow through with this one.
I was pretty scared but eventually went ahead and recorded a video. Then I surprised myself and actually posted it.
And do you know what happened?
Not much.
Some people watched it. Some people liked it. And the few people that spoke to me about it said they enjoyed the video.
That was it.
The reality is most people are indifferent to what I do and to them I’m not that important. The small minority of people that don’t like what I’m doing would never have liked it anyway, and so they move on.
No one sees the anxiety behind what I’m creating or doing, and they don’t really care. So what was I afraid of?
So, what is the “big secret” to overcoming the fear hurdle?
Well it starts with a great Earl Nightingale quote I heard, which I’ll paraphrase.
“Whether it’s going to take ten minutes or ten years to accomplish your goal, the time is going to pass whether you do it or not. So it's better to just do it.”
So I thought fuck it, if I’m scared to do something I may as well do it scared because time will pass either way.
So I just did it.
I gave myself very little time to think about recording a video and simply hit the record button.
Then I hit the publish button. And once the blog posts and videos were out in the world, I felt a weight lift off my shoulders.
It was the first step towards becoming a person that biases towards action instead of procrastination.
That’s something I’ve wanted to be for a long time, but always seem to get stuck at the final hurdle. I let the limiting beliefs take over and give up when the going gets tough.
A trick I use to help me when I feel the limiting beliefs and fear creep back in is to trick my brain into thinking like someone who I aspire to be.
For example, I think what would a professional self help blogger do in this scenario? What would a self help influencer say here?
Convincing myself that I deserve to be heard on the subject, even if the feeling only lasts a few minutes, helps temporarily overcome imposter syndrome and can help me take action.
Slow progress, but progress nonetheless
It’s not like now I just snap my fingers and my limiting beliefs disappear. I still battle with them every single day.
But now the time between having an idea and taking action is getting smaller.
Because I’ve embraced the advice that if you're too scared to do something, then just do it scared because time will pass regardless of whether you’re doing it or not.
I’ve posted a few different videos since and they’re being relatively well received and every time I post a new video I learn something new.
The best thing I found is that most people want you to succeed. If you can add value to someone's life, even through a 5 second video, then they’ll engage.
I used to spend so long convincing myself that everything has to be perfect, that I’d almost talk myself out of ever doing anything.
It’s important to remember that you’re not expected to know everything all at once. You can’t afford to wait until you know everything to start because in reality you’ll never know everything and by the time you think you do it’ll be too late.
A great reminder is that there are people out there with less talent than you, doing what you want to do, because they believe in themselves and are taking action.
That could be you - if you just did something about it.
That reminds me of one of my favourite songs from The Band’s famous movie “The Last Waltz” - it’s a Dr John tune called Such A Night, and the recurring chorus line is - “If you don’t do it, somebody else will.”
In this situation he was talking about stealing someone’s girlfriend, so maybe don’t apply it literally, but you get the idea!
The only way through it, is to do it.
The way I see it, the best way for me to win against my limiting beliefs is by facing them head on and just doing whatever it is I want to do.
That old stoic principle of “The obstacle is the way” rings true here - in short, the only way through it, is to do it.
It absolutely doesn’t work just by clicking your fingers and instantly overcoming limiting beliefs, it takes work. And it takes effort.
But remember, those limiting beliefs only exist in your mind, and you can defeat them. Give yourself permission to do the thing that’ll make you unfathomably happy or proud of yourself.
Shift your mindset and ask yourself, what would a professional do in this case? Then do that.
If you’re like me you’ll still go through all the usual motions and battle with your limiting beliefs before finally getting on top of them.
But you can and will win that battle.
Don’t be a procrastinator, be someone who takes action. Be the person that makes you proud.
Because remember, great ideas without action are just wasted potential.
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