Self Leadership: Fear + Self Esteem = Your Success Level
Self Leadership: Fear + Self Esteem = Your Success Level
But …by themselves, these skills will only get you so far. Have you seen people who seem to be headed for stellar success only to shoot themselves in the foot? People who know every trick, every technique, every theory but still can’t get ahead. There is something more at play. A little something I call my hidden success equation.
People will only ever rise as far as their fear lets them and the determinant of whether or not they are even on a particular ride at all is their level of self-esteem. The level of success you reach is the result of these two internal factors combining.
The universe does not create your success level, it merely reflects back to you what is already inside you. Everyone in life and business is presented with opportunities – whether or not you see them and how you respond to them is purely a function of your fear and self-esteem at the time.
Let’s explore this a bit further. Your self-esteem is your personal belief of your worthiness and deservedness for good things in your life. It is your belief of whether you deserve the great things that happen to you. It is the value you place on yourself, your skills, your needs and wishes.
If you believe deep inside your core that you don’t deserve good things, that somehow you are bad or less than other people, then your self-esteem is not as healthy as it could be.
If your self-esteem is not healthy, then you will often not see the opportunities presented to you. You will discount flashes of insight, great ideas and suggestions as “pie in the sky – I could never do that”. You will procrastinate, delay and self- sabotage. You will wait for others to take action and then blame them if they act in a way that doesn’t match how you would normally do it.
Intuition and self-esteem are linked. The more you discount your intuition because your self-esteem is low, the more you turn down the volume on your radar of opportunities, and the less opportunities you will see. You feel stuck – with no chance to succeed. You stay in the same old routine, wishing your life were better, but not stepping up to make it so.
I see this with businesses all the time. If the CEO or Manager has poor self-esteem then the business will struggle.
Conversely, if you have healthy self-esteem you have an internal compass that tells you that generally you are successful at things you try … so your internal radar is tuned to more opportunities to find even better things to try. You will see more possibilities around you, more chances to succeed. Your success level will be that much greater than people around you as a result. Successful people all have healthy egos.
Where does fear come into the equation? The level to which you lack confidence is the level to which you will experience fear (paraphrasing Mark Douglas).
Fear is a highly debilitating emotion. When your body is in a state of fear, your senses close down except towards the trigger of the fear. You literally can’t see past the fear-inducing trigger. You can’t see other options or find other solutions.
Each opportunity in life carries its own risk – no opportunity comes risk free. If you are fearful of the negative result that may occur, then you will not be willing to fully accept the risk and take the opportunity when it presents itself. If you are afraid of being wrong, then you will do something that will end up making you wrong.
If you are afraid, even if you do see an opportunity in front of you, you will be too scared to take it – worrying that you may fail. You will go out of your way to talk yourself out of the opportunity – looking for all the evidence to support why you shouldn’t do something. You will interpret every bit of data as telling you the reasons why the opportunity wouldn’t have worked. You talk yourself out of success.
So what does success feel like? Have you ever been “in the zone”? Athletes talk about times when they just knew they couldn’t fail and everything was happening smoothly.
Have you ever experienced a time when everything just fell into place … you just responded instinctively to whatever came along, you were fully in the moment and fully present, doing what needed to be done and as a result you were successful? Think back to that time. Did you feel any lasting fear or were you just totally focussed on what you were doing?
When you are in the zone, you are totally aligned – your belief in your capability matches the opportunity in front of you. Fear may be present, but it is put to one side while you focus on what is in front of you.
Athletes don’t just talk themselves into a state of alignment – they combine training, techniques and visualisation with repetition and testing of their limits. They take the data from each test and then build on the data to improve their performance. Each successful athlete takes each success and uses it towards building a belief they can succeed. The belief builds their self-esteem. They know they can fail, but the fear is of failure is less than the will to succeed. That is how success is built.
So … how strong is your self-esteem? How afraid are you of failing? Shift your mental radar upwards and you will experience greater success both in your life and in business.
Self Leadership Fear Self Esteem Your Success Level - To learn more about this author, visit Ingrid Cliff's Website.
Like this article? Share it with your friends
Have you ever wondered why some people seem more successful than others? Yes, there are lots of external techniques that can be taught to improve your outcomes … lots of processes and strategies that once applied help to give a foundation for success.
But …by themselves, these skills will only get you so far. Have you seen people who seem to be headed for stellar success only to shoot themselves in the foot? People who know every trick, every technique, every theory but still can’t get ahead. There is something more at play. A little something I call my hidden success equation.
People will only ever rise as far as their fear lets them and the determinant of whether or not they are even on a particular ride at all is their level of self-esteem. The level of success you reach is the result of these two internal factors combining.
The universe does not create your success level, it merely reflects back to you what is already inside you. Everyone in life and business is presented with opportunities – whether or not you see them and how you respond to them is purely a function of your fear and self-esteem at the time.
Let’s explore this a bit further. Your self-esteem is your personal belief of your worthiness and deservedness for good things in your life. It is your belief of whether you deserve the great things that happen to you. It is the value you place on yourself, your skills, your needs and wishes.
If you believe deep inside your core that you don’t deserve good things, that somehow you are bad or less than other people, then your self-esteem is not as healthy as it could be.
If your self-esteem is not healthy, then you will often not see the opportunities presented to you. You will discount flashes of insight, great ideas and suggestions as “pie in the sky – I could never do that”. You will procrastinate, delay and self- sabotage. You will wait for others to take action and then blame them if they act in a way that doesn’t match how you would normally do it.
Intuition and self-esteem are linked. The more you discount your intuition because your self-esteem is low, the more you turn down the volume on your radar of opportunities, and the less opportunities you will see. You feel stuck – with no chance to succeed. You stay in the same old routine, wishing your life were better, but not stepping up to make it so.
I see this with businesses all the time. If the CEO or Manager has poor self-esteem then the business will struggle.
Conversely, if you have healthy self-esteem you have an internal compass that tells you that generally you are successful at things you try … so your internal radar is tuned to more opportunities to find even better things to try. You will see more possibilities around you, more chances to succeed. Your success level will be that much greater than people around you as a result. Successful people all have healthy egos.
Where does fear come into the equation? The level to which you lack confidence is the level to which you will experience fear (paraphrasing Mark Douglas).
Fear is a highly debilitating emotion. When your body is in a state of fear, your senses close down except towards the trigger of the fear. You literally can’t see past the fear-inducing trigger. You can’t see other options or find other solutions.
Each opportunity in life carries its own risk – no opportunity comes risk free. If you are fearful of the negative result that may occur, then you will not be willing to fully accept the risk and take the opportunity when it presents itself. If you are afraid of being wrong, then you will do something that will end up making you wrong.
If you are afraid, even if you do see an opportunity in front of you, you will be too scared to take it – worrying that you may fail. You will go out of your way to talk yourself out of the opportunity – looking for all the evidence to support why you shouldn’t do something. You will interpret every bit of data as telling you the reasons why the opportunity wouldn’t have worked. You talk yourself out of success.
So what does success feel like? Have you ever been “in the zone”? Athletes talk about times when they just knew they couldn’t fail and everything was happening smoothly.
Have you ever experienced a time when everything just fell into place … you just responded instinctively to whatever came along, you were fully in the moment and fully present, doing what needed to be done and as a result you were successful? Think back to that time. Did you feel any lasting fear or were you just totally focussed on what you were doing?
When you are in the zone, you are totally aligned – your belief in your capability matches the opportunity in front of you. Fear may be present, but it is put to one side while you focus on what is in front of you.
Athletes don’t just talk themselves into a state of alignment – they combine training, techniques and visualisation with repetition and testing of their limits. They take the data from each test and then build on the data to improve their performance. Each successful athlete takes each success and uses it towards building a belief they can succeed. The belief builds their self-esteem. They know they can fail, but the fear is of failure is less than the will to succeed. That is how success is built.
So … how strong is your self-esteem? How afraid are you of failing? Shift your mental radar upwards and you will experience greater success both in your life and in business.
Self Leadership Fear Self Esteem Your Success Level - To learn more about this author, visit Ingrid Cliff's Website.
Like this article? Share it with your friends
 | |
 |
No article feedback found. |
| |
Leave Your Feedback |
 | |
| |||
Dianne CramptonDianne Crampton is an executive leadership coach, team culture consultant, author and president of TIGERS Success Series, Inc. Dianne has been helping CEO's and Executives connect their employees to their core values and goals for over 20 years using the trademarked TIGERS team culture process, which stands for trust, interdependence, genuineness, empathy, risk and success. To download a free white paper on behaviors that build strong teams and behaviors that will predictably tear them down go here. Dianne's contribution to the 2010 Pfeiffer Consulting Journal (an imprint of John Wiley and Sons Publishers) entitled TIGERS Hearted Teams is available in November 2009. Her new book TIGERS Among Us: 5 Winning Business Team Cultures And Why, Three Creeks Publishing will release in March 2010. To receive publishing discounts, subscribe to the free TigerTracks Newsletter here. - Visit Dianne Crampton's Website |
|||
Leanne Hoagland-SmithAre your sales where you want them to be? Will you be one of the few who achieves sales or business success or one of the many who have failed to change? Are you tired of being told you are like everyone else? Then you may find my first book on sales of interest. Be the Red Jacket in the Sea of Gray Suits, The Keys to Unlocking Sales available at Amazon or at http://www.processspecialist.com/red-jacket.htm. This book is a reflection of my no-nonsense approach to improving sales to overall business results. If you are truly committed to making sustainable changes, then I can help you secure a positive return on your investment because I focus on executable solutions not telling you the problems you already know you have. From training to corporate (group) coaching to executive one on one coaching, my approach is to assess, create awareness, build a goal driven action plan and then execute. The bottom line question is "Not do you or your employees know it, but do you or they want to do it?" Please call for a free strategy session at 219.759.5601. - Visit Leanne Hoagland-Smith's Website |
|||
Linda RichardsonLinda Richardson is the Founder and Executive Chairwoman of Richardson, a global sales training and performance improvement company. As a recognized leader in the industry, she has won the coveted Stevie Award for Lifetime Achievement in Sales Excellence and she was identified by Training Industry, Inc. as one of the “Top 20 Most Influential Training Professionals.” Ms. Richardson is credited with the movement to Consultative Selling and is the author of ten books on selling and sales management, including Sales Coaching — Making the Great Leap from Sales Manager to Sales Coach, and Stop Telling, Start Selling. She teaches sales and management at the Wharton Graduate School of the University of Pennsylvania and the Wharton Executive Development Center. Linda is a frequent speaker at industry and client conferences, has been published extensively in industry and training journals, and has been featured in numerous publications, including The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Nation’s Business, Selling Power, Success, and The Conference Board Magazine. Learn more about Richardson's sales training and performance improvement solutions at http://www.richardson.com web - Visit Linda Richardson's Website |
|||
|
To learn more about the Evan Elite Author Program please contact us. | |||
 | |
|  |
Subscribe to Ingrid's articles
 | |
|
|  |
 | |
|
| |
 | |||||||
|
 | ||
|
||
 |
||
|
||
|
| ||
 |
| Have you written articles that would be of value to entrepreneurs? Become an expert on our site by publishing them! Expose yourself to a wide audience, drive more traffic to your website and get more sales! Click Here for details. |
|
|
 |
| Modeling the Masters: Learn the true secrets behind Walt Disney's business success factors & grow your company! Video produced by Phanta Media |
|
|
 |
"Learn straight from Evan how you can Make a Full Time Income (And More) from a Website"
Click Here To Learn More |
|
|
|
|
Get advice & tips from famous business owners, new articles by entrepreneur experts, my latest website updates, & special sneak peaks at what's to come!
|
|
|
 Increasing Coaching Effectiveness 3 Deadly Traps Networking Impacts Income Future Networking Aromatic Networking |
|
 | ||
 |
Top 50 Debt Blogs
Learn To Get Out Of Debt | |
 |
Top 50 Productivity Blogs
Top Blogs To Watch In 2008 | |
| ||
 | ||||
| ||||
|
| ||||
| ||||
|
|
|
|
|
||||||||||||
|
Email us your ideas on how to make our website more valuable! Thank you Sharon from Toronto Salsa Lessons / Classes for your suggestions to make the newsletter look like the website and profile younger entrepreneurs like Jennifer Lopez and Sean Combs!
|
|
|
| ||||||||||
|
| ||||||||||
|
|
||||||||||