Do you ever get in your own way?
I know I do. I have times when I feel in a low mood, everything seems more difficult, and my natural zest disappears.
Many times I have had clients say to me that the only thing stopping them is themselves.
So, how do we deal with this and get back in the flow?
It is never the external obstacle that gets in your way
Of course, there are always going to be external obstacles that we need to navigate. This could be things that you did not anticipate, tasks you do not yet possess the level of skill for, or creating the time required.
But these are never what really stops people.
When thought goes unrecognised
A business leader was teaching a group of new entrepreneurs about raising their game and he wanted to demonstrate what it is that gets in the way.
He had a glass of water on his desk at the front of the room and he went over and picked it up.
Some of the class immediately thought he was going to ask the “Is the glass half empty or half full?” question.
Anticipating this he smiled and asked, “How heavy do you think this glass of water is?”
People gave a variety of answers but to everyone’s amusement he said, “Actually, I don’t have a clue what it weighs, and, in fact, it doesn’t matter.
What really matters is how long you hold the glass for.
If you hold it for a minute or even several minutes, it makes no difference. After an hour it might start to get uncomfortable. Eventually, you would struggle, and it would begin to hurt.”
He went on to explain…
“Fearful thinking is like this. If it comes into your mind and is there just temporarily, that’s fine and perfectly natural. But if you become preoccupied with it, then your ability to function and create the success you want will be compromised.”
Why do we get so preoccupied with fearful thinking?
Fearful thinking is perfectly normal. It is the minds reaction or response to a real or a perceived threat.
If you watch other living creatures you soon notice that they experience fear too. Yet it also passes through them very quickly. They do not keep chewing the thoughts over and over.
But many of us humans have (innocently) taken on the habit of continually thinking fearful thoughts. We keep thinking them because we see the threat as something real that needs to be dealt with.
We can easily misinterpret these kind of feelings as a lack of willpower, discipline, motivation, desire, or intelligence – in other words we blame ourselves and think we are not good enough in some way.
But this just digs us into a hole.
The inherent design of the mind
Imagine you are in a swimming pool and you hold a football under the water.
What does the ball do?
It wants to immediately rise to the surface, and it is only you that is preventing it. It takes energy to hold the ball down and yet none to release it.
Your mind is like the ball. It wants to rise because its inherent nature is to be free, clear, and present. The only thing that prevents it is holding onto thoughts.
Sydney Banks observed:
“Seriousness, like life, is a thought … and this thought creates a feeling. And if you create the feeling of seriousness, then you are in a very serious state …
“You are very liable to have stress, strain, sickness and unhappiness and jealousy and everything else … Now, seriousness doesn’t help you do anything in life, but destroy yourself.”
Bringing greater awareness to your thoughts is powerful. Becoming aware that we only experience thought lightens the load. I found that although I still experience fearful thinking and low moods from time to time I no longer take them so seriously. And so they pass through me far more quickly and easily.
P.S. If you found this article helpful you can read more about, ‘Are you feelings running your business?’ by clicking here.
