6. Courage: “Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one's courage.” ~ Anaïs Nin
I used to be full of fear - fear of the unknown, of making mistakes, of getting it wrong, of missing out, of failure, success, getting out of my comfort zone, pain, hard work, feeling certain feelings, fear of the fear itself. I was the type of risk-averse person who would deliberate for hours, days, sometimes weeks on each decision, tying myself in knots and feeling anxious, paralysed, and still end up undecided. I thought I just wasn’t a courageous person.
For me, it was easy to stay in thinking mode and avoid action mode. Thinking about taking action felt like I was taking action and that was staying safe and cosy in my comfort zone. If I wanted to grow and face my fears, then I needed to muster the courage and step out into the growth zone.
Courage is one of my values* and I’ve always admired people who have a lot of courage. What I didn’t know until recently is that we could train it as a skill, and also that my life would become expansive as my courage grew. I now know that the fear will always be present. I’ve accepted that it’s not about being fearless. It’s about facing my fear and taking courageous action despite it and consistent practice. In the past year, I grew to love the phrase “feel the fear and do it anyway” and I have been learning to be courageous.
How did I manage to muster the courage to do that?
When the fear of taking an action feels overwhelming, I would envision a courageous person doing that same action. If that courageous person was my future self, that was even better. In my visualisation, I see myself overriding the fear, and then feeling satisfied and relieved for taking that action.
I’ve learned to take stock of the cost of not deciding or taking actions, and then weigh them up against the benefits of deciding and taking actions. I’ve learned to tell myself “I will feel so good and relaxed once a decision is made and I take some action”.
An indecision weighs heavily on our minds because it’s an open loop. There’s often a sense of anxiety when we have several important decisions to make, waiting in the queue for our attention. Once a decision is made, the loop is closed, we feel good and our brains relax, no longer pulling our attention.
It’s helpful to distinguish between a reversible decision and an irreversible one. Be decisive in the moment, if it’s reversible, not later or tomorrow, now. Spend a pre-determined amount of time thinking about the pros and cons, if it’s irreversible. The deadline urges us to make a decision either way and cuts down on procrastination.
Once I had made a decision, I still sometimes needed a push to take the first action step. I’ve overcome that hurdle by reframing the first step as an experiment and the second step as evaluation and course-correcting. This way there is no need to make the first step perfect. The pressure is off, the stakes are low.
Over the course of the past year, I proved to myself that I can muster the courage to step out of my comfort zone and take action one day and one task at a time, by measuring the progress backwards from Day 1, acknowledging that progress with my accountability partners, and celebrating the effort of showing up and taking action.
*If you’re interested, you can figure out your values here.
How to feel the fear and do it anyway:
Start with a small and doable decision or action so that you can build momentum and self-belief.
Feel the fear and acknowledge it.
Despite the feeling, visualise yourself taking an action step, until you can feel an uplift in your energy.
Promise yourself you will take that action step.
When that first step is taken, check in with yourself again. How do you feel now? There should be a sense of accomplishment, even if it was a small step.
Congratulate yourself for facing the fear and doing it anyway.
Repeat with another step. Evaluate and course-correct, if necessary.
After a few days or weeks of taking action, look back at Day 1 and celebrate your progress. How do you feel when you were scared of doing something but you took action anyway?
Keep going, keep practising, keep making progress and keep celebrating the small wins!
Now let me ask you:
How good will you feel once you can take action steps towards your goals?
Will you give the above steps a go and let me know how it goes?
Until the next issue, take good care of yourself and your loved ones,
Ikuko 💌