Let’s start with this question- do you really want change?
Believe it or not, it is quite common for someone to consciously convince themselves that they want change in their life, but subconsciously, they put all their efforts into keeping everything exactly the same as it is right now.
Have you ever gone through all the motions of starting a new project, enlist help, buying software, having a website built, creating all kinds of marketing text and tools, only to consistently find some insurmountable challenge when it gets close to a start date that prevents you from following through?
Why would anyone do that to themselves?
Fear...
Fear is the prime reason that most people don’t follow through.
Fear of what?
Fear of success
Fear of failure
Fear of what others might think, say, or do
Or all of the above
Fear not only keeps you in the unhappy space, but also leads to you feeling unmotivated and unfulfilled. You know exactly what needs to be done, but for reasons already mentioned, you never manage to get it done. You are an excellent starter, but when it comes to getting to the finish line, you have rarely ever seen it.
People like this are often solitary individuals who have lots of friends and contacts, but, in reality, they live their life almost entirely in their own heads.
This vicious circle of starting and then stopping, over and over again, can cause low confidence, low self-esteem, anxiety, and depression, which reinforces the overwhelming desire to keep everything the same, no matter how good a new future might look.
Does any of or most of this scenario describe you? If so, what can you do about it?
Is There a Solution?
One of the best ways to break this pattern is to help someone. It can be someone less fortunate than yourself or just less skilled. Perhaps try charitable work or something similar, where people depend on your help, energy, and support, and you know it.
In this charitable work, consider how you have responsibility to others where you cannot possibly let down those who depend on you. That way, you are not working for your own personal rewards, but for someone who cannot possibly fulfil their ambitions on their own.
You will find that the feeling you get from helping others is so strong, so compelling, that your personal anxiety diminishes and your self-esteem rises.
You’ll enjoy the strong feelings of accomplishment and, in turn, you will move closer towards a sense of fulfillment. You’ll find yourself in a place of happiness that you’ve never experienced before, and you may really like it.
Make a Decision and Take Action
Through practical experiences like these, you’ll come to realize that when you make a decision and take action, you move forward in life. You’ll see that you only have one life, and you can live it best and most fully by making small decisions and taking small actions first. This will build the muscle you will soon need to make bigger decisions and take bigger actions.
You’ll also acknowledge that doing things for someone else allows you to fully engage your talents in a way that you could never have experienced while just working for yourself. It just works that way. When someone else is depending on you, you find a way to not let them down. Learn that and apply it to yourself.
When you find purpose in all that you do, you will also realize that the fear evaporated long ago, and now you will be more likely to follow through and you can actually feel a sense of pride in your work that was never there before.
Through the journey of helping others, you’ll come to understand that it doesn’t even matter if you make a wrong decision or take a wrong action. You can always make another decision and take another action and correct it.
The most important thing is that you keep making decisions and taking action. It’s the only way to effect change in anything. The change of follow through so you can make those dreams come true, over and over again.
The biggest changes will be the ones you experience yourself, but it may still take others to point them out to you. You are so amazing, so talented, and you have no idea how gifted you really are, until you see other peoples’ lives improved because of your actions, your follow through.
That’s when you’ll get to see your true, authentic self show up in your smile as you look forward to finally being able to start creating the future you desire.