5 Things You Should Be Doing When You Are Scared Of Stepping Out To Success

I have a friend who always felt scared to step out. He usually asked me if he was good enough. The interesting thing is that he is a great writer but even though he knew it, he felt he wasn’t good enough.
I always pushed him forward and each time I did, he would tell me he was going to try.

I didn’t see his work until one day he started writing for the world to see and today he is very happy he finally stepped out.

Here is what I often told him…

1. Build Your Self-Confidence

“Because one believes in oneself, one doesn’t try to convince others. Because one is content with oneself, one doesn’t need other’s approval. Because one accepts oneself, the whole world accepts him or her."
 -          Lao Tzu

The first thing to do to overcome the fear of stepping out is working on yourself. To build your self-confidence, you must realize that you are in charge. You must know that your success or failure depends on your attitude. You do not expect to succeed when you don’t believe you are good enough for success. You must keep having the mentality of a champion and focus on where you are going, don’t lose faith, don’t lose track and always keep you head high knowing that you’re good enough for success.

Whatever area you might be stepping out into, keep in mind that you are good enough for it. All you do starts with the first step of self-confidence. It triggers your morale and gives you the encouragement you need even when you are not receiving it from others.

Point to note: You are the only barrier to your potential success, no one else is. Don’t wait for others to encourage you. Encourage yourself first.

2. Improve Yourself

“Let us strive to improve ourselves, for we cannot remain stationary; one either progresses or retrogrades."
 -          Mme. Du Deffand

As you go along the road of success, you begin to meet tougher challenges ahead of you. At this point, you are expected to have upgraded else you will remain stagnant and start getting discouraged and feeling like a loser. The only way you can prevent this is to keep learning more, doing more and experiencing more. The more you learn, the more you smash obstacles on your way.

Point to note:  You cannot keep using the beginner’s trick when you get to the expert level. Prepare for the expert level by learning to compete with the expert.

3. Be Ready To Make Mistakes

“Learn from every mistake, because every experience, particularly your mistakes, are there to teach you and force you into being more of who you are.” 
-          Oprah Winfrey

No success is achieved without a mistake. Mistakes are meant to keep you focused, learn more and do better in your next attempt. Do not be discouraged when mistakes occur, rather use your experience to improve your next attempt.

Point to note: There’s no such thing as success without mistakes, make the mistakes and learn.

4. Accept Criticism

“To avoid criticism, do nothing, say nothing, and be nothing.” 

-          Elbert Hubbard

Well, Hubbard's quote says it all. You must be ready to be criticized for you to succeed. Never lose faith when you are criticized. It is part of the learning process and even when you are doing very well, you will still be criticized. So stick to your guns and keep moving on. Listen and learn from criticism and adjust to make things better when it is necessary.

Point to note: Don’t let your critics get to you, get to your critics.

5. Teach Others

“In learning you will teach, and in teaching, you will learn.” 
-          Phil Collins

My best moment of stepping out is when I teach others. When you talk to others, teaching them about something they don’t really know about and are eager to know, you are actually building them up as well as building yourself even much more. You discover you say more than you had planned to say and it just flows with little stress. By teaching others, you are also creating a fan base for yourself.

Point to note: You automatically learn more and gain more confidence when you teach others.

Remember...

It doesn’t hurt to step out… Just start and believe. No matter how bad it gets, it is greatly rewarding at the end as long as you persist and push on.

Have fun stepping out to success. See you there.