You Have Nothing to Fear but Fear Itself

The doormat, the jerk and the lizard brain


The best reason to be a jerk at work is that of course no one will listen to you or support you or embrace your ideas--you're a jerk.


The best reason to be a doormat at work is that in your effort to get along, to be nice, and to go with the flow, of course you won't be expected to stand up and shout, "follow me" when your ideas might take you in a different direction.
Both extremes are the refuge of the lizard brain, the voice of the resistance. They reward the desire to fit in, not to stand out.


"It's not my job" is a comforting refrain when you'd like to hide out. So is, "they all hate me and won't do what I say."


Fear is the driver here, it's fear that pushes people in either of these two directions. That's because in between the two extremes lies responsibility and opportunity and the requirement that you actually do work that matters.
The hard part, the part that gets you rewarded, is understanding that sometimes it is best to use common sense and toe the line, while other times you are facing fear that must be overcome.
Linchpins might be afraid, but they know precisely what they're afraid of. And then they do something constructive about it.

The above was posted on Seth Godin's blog.  If you don't know who Seth is, he is an expert in the area of sales.  Isn't it interesting his analysis of fear being a major motivator in how people show up in their work lives.  The reality, in my opinion, fear drives many things we do, not just in our work lives, but family, social, health, you name it, fear drives us more.

Fear of Loss as we talk about in our industry is motivating more so to most people that the desire for gain.  If you feel like you are about to lose out on an opportunity to advance in your life whatever it may be, the fear of losing out drives more than the result of moving forward on an opportunity.

Interesting how once we move into action, if we continue to focus on the fear associated with action, we most likely will get exactly that, the fear outcome.  To be able to truly focus on the big picture, the goal, the prize if you will must be more important than the idea of not acquiring the goal.

We all know people in our lives that focus so much on the negative things in their lives, and then wonder why they have so many bad things happen to them. 

On the flip side, we also know people who it seems like they consistantly are at the right place at the right time.  I know that it is their focus.  Focus on the positive, not the negative.  KayCee and I have both been in a world over the last 5 years where it was easy to focus on the positive, because, to be honest with you, it was quite simple to earn an amazing income in real estate.

On the flip side of that, when our real estate world started to crumble, I knew with absolute clarity that our situation would get better.  I didn't know how at first, and the desire to have stability and lifestyle were a driving factor. 

The popular saying, or perhaps a new saying to some, "When the why/goal is big enough, the how to doesn't matter."

In a nut shell, there are a million different ways to show up in life, and a million different ways to go after our desires in life.  At the end of the day, we get to make the decsion of what to focus on, and how intensely we focus on them.