If you’re not actively pursuing your dreams, fear is likely to blame. Fear can stop you from taking the actions necessary to achieve success. 

Some people are really good at facing and overcoming their fears, while others could use a few tips. The shocking truth about fear is if you could just increase your courage by 10% your life would change drastically! Yep, that’s all it takes.  When you take more action, it will instantly boost your courage even more. This could apply to any area of your life, personal, professional, financial and spiritual. Overcoming fear is easier with the use of imagination and focus.

If you are open to implementing the following strategies to increase your courage you will accomplish more: 

1) Get extremely clear on what you want.  Clarity is power!  Wherever there is uncertainty there is also less faith and hope.  Take the time to focus on what you really want. Ask yourself questions and write down what it is that you really want to accomplish. Be honest on where you are now, where you want to go and why you must get there. This will get your creative juices flowing for planning.  NOTE: If you have a challenge with this then take a look at what you’re dissatisfied with now and write down what you would like to have instead.  There – you just faced your  fear!

2) Visualize being successful. Fear comes from imagining the worst or reliving your past.   One solution is to imagine a positive outcome (the result you really want). It’s important to make the visualization as real as possible. Use all of your senses and emotion to create a realistic scene in your mind. Like a movie. It’s even better to see this in color.  Imagine how good you’ll feel when you’re successful at what you once feared. 

If you use this technique even one time can be enough to take the edge off your fear and allow you to act. However, if you create a habit of doing this daily, it will make a huge impact on your life.  

3) Imagine your kid  is watching you? It’s easy to let your fears overcome you when you’re alone, but if you’re a parent you don’t want to let your kids down.  We teach them to have courage and that they can do anything they put their minds to. Have you ever noticed that when someone is depending on you, you become a little bolder?  

4) Call on your alter ego. You have multiple “personalities”. There’s the personality you use at work. There’s another personality you use with your friends. Another you use at home. And yet another you’d use at a job interview. You may have the personality you used when you were in college or when you first realized you were “grown”.  

Tell yourself that you’re going to set a good example and be brave. Behave the way you’d want your child to.

5) Change your physiology.  Change your posture. There is a bold and brave person on the inside of you. Become that person. Imagine yourself as the most successful and powerful person in history. How would you stand, breathe, and think?  

Now, take 3 deep breaths. Stand up straight. Look straight ahead. Stand the way a queen or a superhero would stand.  Get your “Wonder Woman stance on and believe you were created for greatness! Remind that person of what they would do when fear creeps in.  Just be that person. It’s all good girl, give yourself permission.

6) Focus on the regret you’ll feel if you fail to act. Instead of thinking about failure, think about the consequences of never trying. Regret is a painful pill to swallow. I’m sure you know someone who is spending the latter years of their life wondering what if and could have done more if they had faced their fears.

They may have had the talent and opportunities, but just couldn’t maximize it. They allowed fear to limit their choices and actions. Now, you see them in their older years not experiencing life as they should have.  They’re either miserable, financially unstable, complaining about everything or living vicariously through their children. DON’T LET THIS BE YOU!

7) Imagine you only have a week left to live. If you knew you were done in a week, I bet you wouldn’t be afraid of anything.  You’d have a different perspective on life, and nothing could bother you because you would have nothing to lose. If you’re going to die soon, you would not care what people thought your failure? Like a great mentor of mine Dr. Myles Munroe “Let death be your motivator”.  Everything looks different when you believe you are running out of time. The reality is you are…we all are. This one helped me get my head in the game

Is fear limiting your choices in life? What would you do if you were free of fear? Give yourself the chance to become fearless and fail forward.  Fortunately, you don’t have to eliminate your fear by 100% to see a drastic change in your life. It just takes a small boost in courage to get the ball rolling. 

The next time you’re faced with fear, try using one of these techniques and notice what happens. Take action and learn a new way of approaching the world – without fear!

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P.S. Hey if you want more information on this – download my audio on How to Become Fearless and Fail Forward.  Feel free to share! Click here