Top Takeaway:
Whatever happens, I’ll be able to handle it.
Overview
I’ve just read for the first time! So it’s going be really fun to get this initial reaction.
The book is “Feel The Fear And Do It Anyway” by Susan Jeffers, PhD. It first came out in 1987 yet the ideas she has in the book still feel very fresh and relevant today. So it’s definitely a classic in the personal development space.
The reason I just read it is I’m actually working through some of my own fears. This insight came up during a really great session last week with my coach. I uncovered just how much my fears are getting in my way.
We talked about how my fear of failure is the shadow side of me wanting to just be doing the best I can as I help people. I want to perform so well that the pressure to perform, so to speak, can often freeze my momentum.
As I read the book through this past week, I made a lot of notes and have a lot of tactics to take with me moving forward.
So my big takeaway? Whatever happens, I’ll be able to handle it. That really does bring out confidence in me, just saying it out loud. And putting that into action has really helped as well, just in a few short days.
And that’s the very first thing Jeffers talks about in the book. She talks about the different types of fear, but that they all really boil down to: whatever happens, we’ll be able to handle it.
We’ve got so many support systems available.
We really are stronger than we think we are.
So it really does bode well for us to be confident knowing we will be able to handle whatever comes our way.
Here are the five truths about fear that she opens up with pretty quickly.
1 – Fear will never go away as long as I continue to grow.
2 – The only way to get rid of the fear of doing something is to actually go out and do it.
3 – The only way to feel better about myself is to go out… and do it.
4 – Not only am I going to experience fear whenever I’m on unfamiliar territory, so is everyone else
5 – Pushing through fear is less frightening than living with the underlying fear that comes from a feeling of helplessness.
So the more confident I am from the doing stuff, the more that I’ll see that I can actually handle whatever comes my way.
That’s my big takeaway from the book: I’ll be able to handle it.
There are so many other great nuggets in here, so I definitely recommend this book if you find that you are also not moving forward as quickly or much and you would like to be.
And if you have any takeaways from the book, I would love to hear them. This is certainly a very relevant topic for me and I’m sure it’s for most of us out there, those of us who are continuing to achieve and develop in our personal and professional.
