Taking That First Scary Step
What step scares you the most about change?
Aloha, this is Soul, the Founder of Soul University. Welcome to our eight part series on embracing change. Over the next few minutes, you’ll see a snippet of a conversation that I’ve had with someone I know to be a powerful change agent. Enjoy.
Let’s dive right in. In part two of this series Bob brought up something that’s really important, and I want to make sure I reiterate that. And that is you really need to be excited about making the change that you might be contemplating in making.
Excited, unbelievably excited. If you’ve ever planned to go on that vacation, or if you’ve ever had that gift you want to give to someone, and you can’t wait to give them that gift. You have that excitement within you. That’s the type of excitement that I’m talking about. You are ready to go.
You have absolutely no idea what might happen, but you’re ready to go. So that type of excitement, when it comes to making change, if you allow that to happen, it’s going to be an adventure. And to allow that to happen more effortlessly, you can do that by becoming more of an explorer versus an analyzer.
Time to introduce our next expert. We have an amazing goddess here with us. Welcome Donna Amos. She is the founder of a brilliant service that works with people who are crazy enough to want to be their own boss, solo entrepreneurs. Quite frankly, anybody who wants to be self employed, they’ve got to be pretty passionate about what they do. And they’ve got to be ready to really change. True Donna?
Donna: Oh, do they ever? They don’t even know.
Soul: I’m curious, Donna, how many decades have you been doing this change agent stuff?
Donna: Really about 20 years.
Soul: Wow. I’m wondering, in the 20 years that you’ve been helping people realize their dreams, I know your expertise is in the field of solo entrepreneurs. However, you’re welcome to branch out into the larger picture. What do you find as you’ve worked with people? What are you sensing to be the number one reason why people resist change.
Donna: From my perception, it is the reluctance to get out of their comfort zone. Even if they’re in a place that they really dislike. Now, they could tell me that they hate their current job. But because it’s what they know. They would rather stay in that place than risk the unknown.
Soul: You’re talking about a term I’ve heard in the past, the golden handcuffs.
Donna: Yeah, I haven’t heard that, but that’s a perfect example.
Soul: The golden handcuffs. They are tied. They are shackled. Or they feel they’re tied or shackled to something they really don’t like. But! Because it affords them a level of comfort, whether it’s a lifestyle or prestige and title or whatever the case may be, they’re reluctant to ask for that key to get those handcuffs off.
Donna: Yes, absolutely. So much so that they believe that from the perspective I’m coming from, somebody in a job that they hate. They believe there’s security in that position. And I think the world has shown us in the last couple of years that there’s no such thing.
Soul: Totally. Totally. So with that thought in mind, how has this recent whirlwind tsunami of change that we’re experiencing, how are you helping people actually begin to resolve their resistance to change?
Donna: It takes a lot of steps. A lot of baby steps. First it’s helping them to try to visualize the big picture. To really tap into what they’re passionate about. To get excited about that. Get their emotions going. But then helping them to step back and know, okay, you don’t have to go from where you are today to that big picture in the next 48 hours. You let’s take little tiny steps because little tiny steps people can do.
Soul: And it helps bring everybody else along for the ride. I think what I’m hearing you say is if we don’t take those big steps, we can probably feel overwhelmed. And if I’m feeling overwhelmed, then everybody else I know will probably feel overwhelmed. What good is that?
Donna: Yeah, exactly, because I’m going to share my my current state of being with everybody that’s, around me.
Soul: Small steps. Now, okay, great. We’ve got the big picture in mind. We’re all excited about it. It’s like a magnet. It’s attracting us to make those steps. But I am frozen in fear of even taking that very first, what do I do?
Donna: Here’s the other thing. That taking that very first step sometimes feels huge. It doesn’t feel like a little tiny step, it feels like a really big step. Knowing that they have support and, helping them to acknowledge where that base of fear is coming from. If it is “I’m afraid that if I do take this step that I might fail?” So what does that really look like? Okay, so let’s say you take the step and you fall flat on your face, okay? So, we’re pretty resilient people when it comes down to it. We can pretty much recover from anything.
Just acknowledging that it’s not going to be the end of the world, can sometimes help people. They can feel that fear, but they can do it anyway. They can take that step regardless of the fact that they are afraid. That they may not be up to the task. Or that maybe they’ll even, surprise themselves at how genius they are.
Soul: Which is often the case.
Donna: Yeah.
Soul: So I’m hearing you say, just buck it up. Just do it. Get your ducks in a row. Ask for help. What I’m hearing you say is really what’s the worst thing that can happen is you don’t ask for help. You don’t tell anybody you need any help. And then you fall flat on your face and you don’t have anybody to go get help from.
If I’m hearing you correctly Donna, you’re saying that to take that first step. Imagine the worst. Put some support structure around it just in case you need it. It’s not like you’re wanting it to be the worst thing to happen to you, but at least you’ve got that bed to land on in case you do get a brick wall.
Donna: Yeah, absolutely. You have to have support. And that’s of course, again, because I work with soul business owners, that’s the one piece that they often leave out. When they do fall down, they have somebody to help them get up and dust their knees off. And look at what happened and make adjustments and, go forward again.
Soul: So that gift of perspective is what I’m hearing you saying.
Donna: Very good, Soul. Yes. Gift of perspective.
Soul: Excellent. We could take another day talking about this, but we’re going to keep these short, concise. Donna, as always, you’ve been a goddess. Thank you so much.
Donna: Thank you for having me Soul.
Soul: Thanks again for reading. If you need assistance with embracing change, we’ll see you in class. Aloha!