Doubt and fear are like two cheeky monkeys brothers on the same bench. They sit there and allow you to stay safe on the one hand however if the conversation on the bench gets too loud they take over.
Doubt and fear are intertwined. On the one hand fear tries to keep you safe by giving you an emotion caused by a threat of danger, pain and harm whilst doubt makes you feel uncertain about something. The combination of the two can stop us in our tracks and do what we know we should and mostly want to do.
So how best can we take the lead here and be the leader of these two evils
1.Be honest with you and what you are
We all like to think we know who we are, how we go about what we do and what impact we are having. The reality is that most of the feedback mechanisms come from our perception. If you are feeling strong these awareness may be more open and realistic. On the other hand if you are feeling weak (lack of sleep, food, overwhelm…) the concept of your self awareness can be very different. Finding the mechanism, time and being in the right mindset will allow you to honest with yourself is essential. yourself what fears and doubts are stopping you today?
2. Hold up the Mirror
Being truly honest with ourselves can be the hardest thing. We can distort what we remember and your imagination can take over. Looking in a mirror can give the reality as to what is there. Its not just physically looking at the mirror and seeing the grey or wrinkles. Its about seeing what we cant see ourselves or as Johari Window would describe our blind spot. This may mean asking from trusted people what they see.
3. Draw on your inner strength
Having recently completed some research on what makes leaders stronger and weaker I know that its a combination of three things. Human needs like sleep and real wholesome food with some exercise thrown in, keeping informed so you can be best prepared with what may be on the horizon and relationships with people. If you are managing that you will feel stronger and not allow the doubt and fear thoughts to even be on the agenda.
4. Build on past internal successful resources
You will be able to identify with previous occasions when doubt and fear has got in the way. Whether abseiling a cliff metaphorically or in reality you will have had to trust the environment. You would have felt safe. You therefore know you can do this and its drawing on these resources of knowledge that will keep the doubt and fear voices quietly discussing on the bench
5. Recognise that everyone is in the same boat.
No leader of life or people gets away from the fear / doubt monkeys. As many of you may well have read before, as humans we know that these are evolutionary mechanisms that we have developed to keep us safe. This is the same for the global, regional, national, local and new leaders I work with yet for some reason we feel that they are different and have some magic dust. The dust comes from completing 1–4. The trick or dust of gift for yourself is to remind yourself of that.
Doubt and fear are like two cheeky monkeys brothers on the same bench. When you are feeling strong in yourself you the cheeky monkeys wont even be close to giving you any bother.
