Positive Principles Newsletter
May 2007
____________________________________________
Key Quotes:
“Failure is simply
the price we pay to achieve success.”
- John Maxwell, Failing Forward
“He who makes no mistakes makes no progress.”
- Theodore Roosevelt
“A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable but more useful
than a life spent doing nothing.”
- George Bernard Shaw
____________________________________________
This
month's tip –
Replace Fear with FAITH.
It can come in
any number of situations – launching a new business, introducing an idea
to grow your employer’s business, speaking before a large audience, etc.
It can limit your thinking and paralyze your action. Its name is fear, and
its opposite is faith.
Neither fear nor faith really exists – except within our minds. Let’s look
closely at the definition of these two words:
Fear
- a feeling of alarm or disquiet caused by the expectation of danger,
pain, disaster, or the like
Faith - a confident belief in the truth, value, or trustworthiness
of a person, idea, or thing
Both
feelings come from our beliefs about the outcome of a future event. Fear
represents a belief in a negative outcome, and faith represents a belief
in a positive outcome. Since we can choose our beliefs, we can choose
either fear or faith.
Fear and faith oppose each other. They cannot coexist in our thinking
about any given situation. If you have one, you cannot – by definition –
also have the other. Fear and faith are mutually exclusive states of
belief.
You can
move with the faith that you can overcome failure or you can cower in fear
that you will fail. The choice is yours. With this simple five step model,
you can make the choice of FAITH.
Frame failure properly
Recognize
that failure is an event and not a person. You are not a failure because
you have failed. Learn to view failure as an opportunity to learn and not
as a terminal condition. Frame failure properly.
Accept failure as normal
The average
successful entrepreneur makes between 3 and 4 business attempts before
achieving lasting success. In Failing Forward, John Maxwell says: “Failure
is simply the price we pay to achieve success.” Accept failure as normal.
Ignore
the critics
Look
carefully at the definitions of critic, criticism, and criticize in your
dictionary. You will notice that each of them has a negative connotation.
Critics seldom have experience or insights that will help you succeed, so
ignore them. This does not imply that you should ignore all input from
everyone you know. You should seek wise counsel from people with
experience, and ignore the critics.
Take action
Fear breeds
inaction. Inaction breeds inexperience. Inexperience breeds incompetence.
Incompetence breeds more fear. If you wait for fear to go away before you
act, you will never act. In Failing Forward, John Maxell quotes
educational psychologist Jerome Bruner as saying: “You’re more likely to
act yourself into feeling than you are to feel yourself into action.” Take
action.
Hang-on to hope
In this
context, you should stay positive but not blindly optimistic. Recognize
the reality of your current situation – however bad it might be – and
refuse to let go of the hope for your eventual success. As Abraham Lincoln
said, “When you extinguish hope, you create desperation.” You do not want
to act out of desperation. Hang-on to hope.
In their hit song Already Gone, The Eagles say “So often times it
happens that we live our lives in chains, and we never even know we have
the key.” Fear places chains on you and FAITH is the key.
So for now,
I encourage you to remember this month's tip . . .
Replace Fear with FAITH.
Have a great day,
Guy Harris
The Recovering Engineer
