Following is the contents of Chapter 17 of The Science of Getting Rich, by Wallace D. Wattles. Through the course of the book, Wattles develops and amplifies on these statements and considers them to be the essential points that anyone practicing the art of conscious creation must master. Without further ado:

There is a thinking stuff from which all things are made, and which, in its original state, permeates, penetrates, and fills the interspaces of the universe.

A thought in this substance produces the thing that is imaged by the thought.

Man can form things in his thought, and by impressing his thought upon formless substance can cause the thing he thinks about to be created.

In order to do this, man must pass from the competitive to the creative mind; otherwise he cannot be in harmony with the Formless Intelligence, which is always creative and never competitive in spirit.

Man may come into full harmony with the Formless Substance by entertaining a lively and sincere gratitude for the blessings it bestows upon him. Gratitude unifies the mind of man with the intelligence of Substance, so that man’s thoughts are received by the Formless. Man can remain upon the creative plane only by uniting himself with the Formless Intelligence through a deep and continuous feeling of gratitude.

Man must form a clear and definite mental image of the things he wishes to have, to do, or to become; and he must hold this mental image in his thoughts, while being deeply grateful to the Supreme that all his desires are granted to him. The man who wishes to get rich must spend his leisure hours in contemplating his Vision, and in earnest thanksgiving that the reality is being given to him. Too much stress cannot be laid on the importance of frequent contemplation of the mental image, coupled with unwavering faith and devout gratitude. This is the process by which the impression is given to the Formless, and the creative forces set in motion.

The creative energy works through the established channels of natural growth, and of the industrial and social order. All that is included in his mental image will surely be brought to the man who follows the instructions given above, and whose faith does not waver. What he wants will come to him through the ways of established trade and commerce.

In order to receive his own when it shall come to him, man must be active; and this activity can only consist in more than filling his present place. He must keep in mind the Purpose to get rich through the realization of his mental image. And he must do, every day, all that can be done that day, taking care to do each act in a successful manner. He must give to every man a use value in excess of the cash value he receives, so that each transaction makes for more life; and he must so hold the Advancing Thought that the impression of increase will be communicated to all with whom he comes in contact.

The men and women who practice the foregoing instructions will certainly get rich; and the riches they receive will be in exact proportion to the definiteness of their vision, the fixity of their purpose, the steadiness of their faith, and the depth of their gratitude.

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“When a resolute young fellow steps up to the great bully, the world, and takes him boldly by the beard, he is often surprised to find it comes off in his hand, and that it was only tied on to scare away the timid adventurers.”

— Ralph Waldo Emerson

 This is in my notable quotes (see the top of the page). Isn’t this the truth?

Keywords: resolute, boldly, timid.

Resolute–acting with determination, with the faith that the endeavor will be accomplished. Boldly going where you haven’t gone before because timidity is your normal habit (sorry, Star Trek).

Resolve, resolute, resolution. Very powerful words, yes?

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Fear. Fear of failure, fear of success. Fear of rejection, fear of embarrassment. Fear of poverty, fear of wealth.

Fear is insidious. It slips in early in life. It builds upon itself. Fear is a demon that grows stronger and larger every time he works his evil. He becomes more vibrant and hideous until he rules your entire life. Fear is a habit, a habit of thought. The more you exercise your ability to fear, the more it shows up. Pretty soon, fear is habitual behavior.

It starts with the best of intentions, mostly:

“Don’t ride too fast, you’ll fall and hurt yourself.”
“Be home before dark–the world is a dangerous place.”
“You stupid clod. Can’t you do anything right?”

Fear brings with it a host of related emotions: worry, hate, doubt, uncertainty, jealousy and more. All these are fear behind a different face.

Fear, in any form, will ruin your life. Stagnation, never moving on, never improving yourself, is rooted in fear. Closing your eyes to opportunity is rooted in fear. What you’re saying when you say this: “Why bother? It’ll never work for me.” is that “I’m afraid that it won’t work. I’ll get my hopes up and it won’t happen. So I’m not going to try.”

The worst thing about fear is that it draws toward you the very thing you fear. Have you ever noticed that many of the things you worried the most about, gave the majority of your attention to, finally came to pass? You have attracted the very thing you were afraid of. How? By paying attention to it with strong emotion. By focusing on what you fear, you put in motion events and circumstances that cause that fear to materialize. It’s the way things work.

Banish the demon

Don’t expect to kill off demon fear. He’ll always be around, and he can actually be useful–at times. But you can banish him away to the furthest recesses of your mind to be called upon only when needed. You can make him so small that his normal efforts will be inconsequential.

How? What is this force that can overcome fear?

Simply put, courage. Courage is the opposite emotion of fear. You can’t deny away fear, for then you are focusing on fear. You have to work on habituating the new, opposite emotion of courage. Don’t say, “I’m not afraid.” Say instead, “I am courageous.” Hold in your mind the image of the courageous person that you want to become. Whenever fear appears, replace it.

It won’t be easy, and it won’t be a task you can accomplish overnight but if you persist your habit of being fearful will become weak, and your habit of courageous behavior will become stronger.

You know that the mind can’t tell the difference between an actual event and a vividly imagined one. Denis Waitley showed us that with his work with Visual Motor Rehearsal techniques with Olympic athletes. So use that in your work to rid yourself of fear.

Vividly imagine yourself in situations that caused fear in the past. Change your behavior in your imagination to what a courageous person would do–what you would do if you were filled with courage, strength, and confidence. See yourself acting, speaking, walking, moving as you would if you were courageous and confident.

Use many different scenarios–as many as you can think of. What would you do if you weren’t afraid? Whenever you have a free moment in the day, take the time to diminish the effect of fear in your life. Make it a project. Make it an important project–one that your life depends upon.

Because your life does depend upon ridding yourself of fear. Your happiness, fulfillment, enjoyment, even playfulness, will increase many-fold when you get rid of your habit of being fearful.

So do your exercises. Strengthen the courage factor, the courage habit. You’ll find that, over a period of time, your thinking will switch from “I can’t” to “I can” just from the absence of fearful thoughts. After “I can” comes “I will”.

“I can and I will”, felt with enthusiasm and confidence, is one of the most powerful thoughts in the universe. “I can and I will” is first cousin to “I AM”. When you know you can, and you know you will, and you know you ARE the person who can and will, you are unstoppable. You’ll have gone from wishing that something was to expecting that something is.

That, dear readers, in case you didn’t catch it, is the Law of Attraction at work.

Get rid of fear and live your life the way it was meant to be lived–in joyous abundance.

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Pam at Make the Most of U wrote a great response (and tagged me in the process) to Aaron Potts’ request for ‘Simply Successful Secrets’, an interactive research project that he’s started (which also included me, I see, but I missed the request somehow).

I really like seeing discussions like this, because when I start to think about the questions, I notice areas in my thinking that could use improvement or even complete overhaul.

Take success, for instance. When I first thought about how I would respond, my initial thought was, “I can’t answer this. I’m not successful.” Then I proceeded to list to myself all the reasons why I don’t think I’m successful (remember—the mind will give what you ask of it): there’s bills that aren’t paid because I’m not taking the actions that I should take business-wise because my brain is so messed up and there’s so much baggage that I can’t get around because I’ve tried everything I know and nothing’s worked because I’m no good at this stuff because I don’t try hard enough because I’m not worth anything…

Short story is I let myself go way off the deep end. After I realized what I was doing (it took a while, I’m not perfect), I made a herculean effort to change my internal conversation. “When I am successful, what do I do?”

“Nothing. You’re not successful.”

“Shut up. I am too. Get back in your cave, little man. Brain: what do I do when I’m successful?”

After some back and forth, the angelic little man on my other shoulder (remember the football field scene in ‘Animal House’?) told me things that I do when I’m being successful. So here’s my list, in no particular order:

1. I am.

This is the ‘being’ part of the have, do, or be anything you want in goal setting. It’s not exactly what most goal-setting coaches have in mind when they say it, but I think it comes first. Before you have and do the things that the person you want to be has and does, first you have to be that person in your mind. If you don’t know how that person would be, find someone you can model. Or find several people and take the best qualities of each.

2. I read daily.

I read constantly. Books, blogs, etc. Used to be, before I was successful, I read fiction books. I was absolutely hooked on action/suspense books. Tom Clancy, Dan Brown, J.D. Robb, etc. I still read those occasionally, when I want a little break. But now I read things that help me reach for new possibilities. As a matter of fact, part of my herculean effort above was to read. I read, front to back, a book named The Greatest Networker In The World, by John Milton Fogg. It was intended as a training tool for network marketers, but is more of a training tool for life and life changes. I highly recommend it.

3. I exercise regularly.

Lately, irregularly would be a better description, but I still do. My little spider-bite ordeal kept me from being as active as I like to be, but I have substantially recovered from that so it’s not as inhibiting. I go to the Y a minimum of 4 times a week; more if I can get there. Sometimes I work on the stair machines and treadmill, sometimes walking on the track, sometimes swimming. When the kids go, it’s all swimming. That’s the best workout I get, truthfully. My kids could wear me out!

4. I spend time with my goals.

I’m building on my vision board, which resides on the wall to the left of my computer monitors. I have my goals written down (do you?), and I spend some time throughout the day visualizing them, sometimes modifying them if they’re not quite right.

5. I spend time with myself.

In the morning, I make a special point to think about the things in my life that I’m thankful for. If I can’t think of more than 4 or 5, I know it’s time for an attitude adjustment. I also take an hour or two each day to read, to work with a Neuro-Programming program I picked up, and some time in my version of meditation. I’m not very good at the meditation thing yet, but the NP program is helping that. I’m finding it challenging to quiet my mind. It seems like it’s always going. During meditation, I accept the thoughts that enter, dismiss them, only to find that another has taken its place. Meditation is a work in progress for me.

6. I do something to promote my business.

One of the areas that I could do better in. This, truthfully, is where a lot of my personal work is taking place. Talking to people, learning to be comfortable in selling situations, just doing something. My comfort zone has not included direct interaction with other people. So, I’m improving that, little by little.

7. I spend time with my family.

Part of this is necessity: we homeschool our kids, and that does take a chunk of time during the day. There’s also piano lessons, recitals, nightly reading, RC airplanes, and of course our twice-weekly jaunts to the YMCA. I used to be a hermit in the computer room, and my family life suffered. Now it’s better. Focus, you know.

So…

…while I’m not yet what most would term wildly successful in some areas, that will show up in it’s good time, when I’m ready for it. I understand that. All I can do is what I know — then watch, and adjust.

That’s all any of us can do.

Thanks Pam and Aaron for the shoulder tap. I’m not going to tag anyone specifically, but I would enjoy comments and linkbacks telling me what YOU are doing to be successful in your life. If you don’t think you are, tell me what you would be doing if you were successful.

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When a new, inspired thought comes into your mind on how to achieve something you want, what is your next thought? Is it, “Wow! That’s fantastic! I’m on it!”? Or is it something like this, with a dejected look, “That’ll never work. I’m too [ugly/short/fat/stupid/lazy/broke/tall/skinny]. That’s just not me.”

Don’t answer. I know what you’ll probably say, if you’re being truthful.

Don’t you think it’s time to get past that?

My challenge to you: when a new idea pops in, immediately write down 10 ways that you can get it done, or reasons why you can do it. Brainstorm a little. Give yourself a little credit, eh? You’re resourceful. Use your resourcefulness to come up with a bunch of reasons. Then write them down. That’s important.

Your knight in tarnished armor

There’s always going to be the little guy on your shoulder telling you all the reasons why you shouldn’t try something. That’s ok. He’s there to protect you. He just doesn’t know that while he may be protecting your ego, he’s hurting you in ways he doesn’t know. So–tell him to be quiet. Say, “Thanks for your concern, but it’s time to go back to your hole now.”

One more word of advice on the little guy: don’t hold conversations with him. Tell him to go away, then give no more attention to him, at all. Giving him attention makes him stronger. Withhold your attention, and his voice will diminish. It will get so soft and squeaky that when you hear it, you’ll laugh. You can thank him for his efforts, and put him back in the closet.

Give your attention to what you want

Back to the positive. When you’ve finished writing your list of reasons, don’t throw them away! Keep them in front of you, and add to them. Give attention to this list of why you can. Concentrate your thinking there. Write more reasons down when you think of them–and think of them you will, when your attention is on why you can.

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Von Goethe said, “The magic is believing in yourself, if you can do that, you can make anything happen.” Claude Bristol wrote a whole book about belief: The Magic of Believing. Napoleon Hill: “Whatever the mind of man can conceive and believe, it can achieve.” Henry Ford said, “Whether you think you can or not, you are right.”

What good does a whole list of goals, painstakingly thought out, do if a person does not believe they are possible? Why would one expend mental and physical effort to do a thing that is thought to be undoable?

I think that if there is any one key to success, it is belief. An idea is a dream, nothing more, until it is acted upon. Action will not happen until one believes the successful fruition of the idea is at least possible.

“I can’t do that.” “I’ll never be able to do that.” “That’s just not me.” “What?! You’ve got to be kidding. That’s not something I can do.” “That’s impossible.”

Do you think that someone who uttered any of the phrases above would have a snowball’s chance in Miami (gotcha!) of succeeding? Unlikely.

Belief. Belief in yourself, believing that you’re worthy, believing that you have what it will take, knowing, believing, that you will do or be whatever it might take. When you have that level of belief, of conviction, you will open yourself and your world to the power of the universe. What you want will become. Belief will connect you.

Without belief, without conviction, you will observe life as if from the outside of a glass wall, looking in. Life will pass you by; the things you want to be, have, and do will float on the other side of the glass, out of reach, just ethereal fantasies to taunt you.

Until you believe. Then you know that there is no glass wall. The glass wall was within you, holding you back from having, being, doing.

Believe! It is magic, and with it, anything is possible.

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One of the biggest difficulties that we encounter when we embark on the path of self-improvement is the tendency to, once we find we can make changes in our lives, try to change everything at once.

While this is possible, (see Tony Robbins’ distinctions on identity) what usually happens is that the pile of what needs changing is so high that we get discouraged before we even start.

So don’t do that. Duh.

Choose 2 or 3 changes that, at this moment in time, you feel most excited about being able to make. Then change those things.

Then choose another group, make the changes, and then another group.

One bite at a time. If you choose the areas that you are most excited to make a change in, and keep your change-it-now list at a manageable size, the mountain that needs to be scaled doesn’t loom so large.

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Pam at Make the Most of U wrote a great post on fear: Fear, a Four Letter Word. I encourage you to read it.

I have struggled with various fears all my life; most of us have. Some are minor, some I haven’t been able to deal with yet.

For many people, fear of public speaking is a deal-breaker. Me? I don’t have a problem with it. I kind of enjoy it, especially when I really know what I’m talking about. I know people, though, who get physically ill anticipating standing up in front of groups of people, large or small. One friend spends time praying to the porcelain goddess before she speaks. But she does it (speaks, that is), in spite of her physical and mental reaction. Bravo!

Can you imagine what it would be like to live your life without unnecessary fears? I like the way Pam put it:

For just one moment imagine having the ability to flow, to really move through your day without doubt or fear. Imagine diving into new projects, taking exciting risks, setting dreams into action without the second guessing or the white knuckles. What would that be like? What would that feel like?

So how do we get over, under, around, or through the fears that are holding us back from being what we can be?

One way is by using pain and pleasure (actually, that’s pretty much the only way; the difference is what the pain and pleasure are applied to). If the desire of what you want to accomplish is so strong within you that you’d do almost anything to achieve it, then fears seem to not be as important as they used to be. So the first method is to really get emotional about what you want — really get into it, feel the feelings of having accomplished it. Live your dream in your mind, see yourself doing the things you fear while you have this sense of power. Many times, that’s all it takes. And after you’ve taken the feared action a few times, you’ll realize that what you were afraid of isn’t so bad — it might even be fun!

But a great many of us haven’t been able to get that particular process to work effectively, for whatever reason. Our fears still limit us. So maybe we can work on the specific fear itself?

What we’re basically going to do is overwhelm the fear with power and confidence. We’ll change the association of the event, and use a ‘trigger’ to help us do that, then condition the change so that it lasts.

What is a ‘trigger’?

A ‘trigger’ is an event that causes a reaction. You experience them every day, if you stop to think about it. A sight, an aroma, a sound, a touch: when you experience it, it causes you to remember an event or occurrence from your past; often with vivid clarity. The trigger is stored in your mind whenever something unique happens to you when you are at an increased emotional level.

For instance, say you are in a situation where you are experiencing overwhelming feelings of love and connection with someone. They run their hand over your cheek, and say some particular unusual thing.

Years later, you are sitting with another someone, and they run their hand over your cheek and say the same words, in the same tone of voice. POW! The original intense feelings you had at the first occurrence come flooding back in, and you feel wonderful! You have no idea why you feel so wonderful, but you do.

That is a trigger at work. So how do we harness this powerful reaction for our deliberate use to transform fear into power?

Here are the basic steps to take:

• decide on a trigger combination
• take yourself to a time when you were feeling enormously powerful and confident
• consciously create a trigger, or anchor, to those feelings.
• test your trigger; if it doesn’t work very powerfully, do the steps again

Let’s take this one step at a time…

Decide on a trigger

You want your trigger to be a combination of things that are unlikely to happen by accident. A combination of touch and sounds works well here, and the more specific you can be, the better. You may wish to make the trigger something unobtrusive so that you can use it when you need to without fear of drawing attention to yourself. Do something and say something at the same time. Twist your earlobe and say, “YES!”. Pull the hairs on your arm, and say, “Now!” (That one wasn’t good for me — that’s what my mother used to do when she was insistent on my doing something that I didn’t feel the need to do).

You get the idea. Do something and say something unique. Then…

Feel confident and powerful

There are times in your life when you’ve felt on top of the world — you have accomplished something perfectly and powerfully. It is a time when you puffed your chest out and said to yourself, “Yeah! That’s me!” The emotional intensity of one of those times is what we want to tap into.

Find a quiet spot with few distractions, and pick one of those powerful events in your past. In your mind, take yourself back there. It is important that you do this vividly; experience what you felt at that time. Re-run the experience in your mind, feeling the things you felt, seeing what you saw, hearing the sounds that you heard, the textures of things you touched, how you breathed…re-live that moment in your mind.

Remember–the mind can’t distinguish between an imagined event and a real one. So instead of just fondly remembering what happened, you must place yourself there again, as if it were happening now.

Create a trigger

When you are fully and completely immersed in your experience, perform your trigger combination that you decided on. Again, you want this to be something unique; something that most likely wouldn’t occur in everyday life. Pinch your forearm and say, “Boo!”, or something of the sort, the more unique, the better.

It is important that you do this process several times, to condition the trigger. Relax for a minute, then go back into your powerful experience again. Do the trigger combination. Rinse, and repeat.

Test your trigger. After some repetition of the creating process, you should be able to fire your trigger and feel the same intense feelings of power and confidence that you experienced while immersed in your rememberance. If you don’t, rinse and repeat until you do. Then, …

Test the trigger

It is helpful at this stage, but not essential, that you enlist a friend or loved one to assist you. If, say, rejection is what you’re working on, have the other person reject you in the manner that you’re scared of. Say the things, do the things that you’re frightened will happen. Not too intensely, at the start.

It’s important that you do this step quickly. You don’t want to get terribly immersed in the fear feelings, the intensity of them, especially if the fear you’re working on is very intense. Many times, at the beginning of the process, the mere thought of doing what you fear is enough–the slightest emergence of the feeling of fear. When you just begin to feel uncomfortable,…

Pull your trigger

Do your trigger combination. Using our rejection example, have your assistant reject you and as they are, pull your trigger. Feel the feelings of power and confidence that happen when you do it.

As your feelings of fear about your situation begin to recede, repeat the process with increasing levels of intensity on the part of your assistant, or if you aren’t using an assistant, deeper immersion in your fear experience.

After a few trips through the steps, you should be feeling a feeling of power associated with the circumstance you used to fear. If you’re not, check the pitfalls and caveats below, then…rinse and repeat. Change your approach a little, then do it again. Keep working on it.

Pitfalls and caveats

If you find the process isn’t working well, the first thing to look at is the intensity of the emotions of power and confidence you’re using when you create your trigger. It’s vitally important that these emotions be intense, otherwise the trigger will be ineffective. If the event you’re using isn’t powerful enough, remember a different one. You do have more than one, trust me. Sometimes we get so down on ourselves that the reaction to this is, “I’ve never felt confident in my life!” Get yourself out of that emotional state of depression, however you have to do it, and start remembering again. There are times you’ve felt confident and powerful. You know there are. Get there.

Another possibility for less-than-optimum results is that your trigger sequence isn’t unique enough or strong enough. You must use something that would not normally happen, and something that doesn’t already have emotions attached to it. That’s why pulling my arm hairs and saying “NOW” didn’t work for me. I already had emotions attached to that sequence, although I didn’t remember them until I ran the sequence (how’s that for demonstration of how effective triggers can be?).

Sometimes the fear you’re working on isn’t really the problem, and you don’t find out until you get into the situation. Normally, that won’t be a big deal, if your trigger is powerful enough. You can fire it off and still feel the feelings of power and confidence. If you find that it’s not working well, recondition your trigger, and apply it to the new circumstance in the same way.

In conclusion,

I hope this process will prove as helpful to you in overcoming your fears as it has mine. There are many nuances to this technique that I haven’t been able to touch on here, simply because of the depth of the topic. If what I’ve outlined isn’t enough to help you through, I encourage you to read further on the subject from authors like Tony Robbins, in his book, Awaken The Giant Within (aff), and others who teach NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming), from which this technique is derived.

Even more helpful if you find yourself blocked from progress would be working with a coach like Pam (see her site for more info), or with a person specially trained in NLP and other technologies for change such as Wendy Piersall, who I greatly admire. Tell them I sent you!

Thanks for reading; your comments or questions are appreciated…

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The question, “Who am I?” has the potential of being a very dangerous question to those of us on the ‘improving our lives’ path. Why? Because of the basics of how the mind works: if a question is put to it, it will answer it–even if it has to invent an answer.

If you ask, “Why do I always fail?”, your mind will answer. “Because you’re an idiot who can’t walk and chew gum at the same time.” “Because your mother told you that you would.” “Because your father was a failure.” “Because your father was a great man and how could you possibly walk in his shoes?”

You can reframe that question to, “Why do I always succeed at what I do?” Your mind will answer. “Because you don’t stop until it’s done.” “Because you’re smart, and you can figure anything out.” “Because you’re a bulldog–you don’t let go until you get what you want.”

Do you see the difference?

But I’m having a problem with this. “Who am I?” should not be a bad question–unless the answers I’m getting back are not what I want to hear. When that happens, I fall into the “what you resist persists” rabbit-hole. “What you focus on, you will get.” “We become what we think about most.” So how to reframe this question so that it empowers me? That’s difficult because it is such a basic question. Or how can I stop asking the question at all?
But should I?

When it comes to changing our lives, some of us view ourselves as so screwed up that we don’t know where to start. So we run in circles, in overwhelm mode, and end up not making any changes. Or even worse, we can’t think of a specific change to make, because we’re finding it difficult to get down below the global level to the specific, core-level beliefs, rules, and values that need adjustment.

For me, I have an answer.

A thought came to me that I know I’ve had before, but I haven’t paid attention to it: “I don’t like the answers I get when I ask, ‘Who am I?’. So why don’t I use the answers to make some changes?” This may seem elementary to most of you, but for me, it was a profound question. The concept is helping me clarify with precision the changes that I need to make in order for me to be comfortable with the answer to “Who am I?”

So in addition to asking, “Who am I?”, I ask, “Who do I want to be?”. The contrast in answers shows me what area I need to work on. But I don’t spend a lot of time pondering. I use the first answer that I get. Why? It is that answer that is at the forefront of my consciousness. It is what is most important to me at that particular time. It’s what I’m focusing on. So that is what I’ll continue to focus on.

I am, though, using multiple “Why?” questions to move closer to the root belief that I must change. When I determine that a change needs to be made, I’ll keep asking, “Why do I think this way?”, or maybe just, “Why?” to the answers I get. This helps me better identify what I need to work on at that time.

Then I can use NLP techniques, or EFT, or some other technology to effect the change. The technology doesn’t matter, as long as it works and the changes last, and you follow the same basic success formula:

1. know what you want
2. take action
3. notice whether it’s working
4. change your approach if necessary

The very important thing that I’ve done here is this: I’ve clarified what I want. What is the outcome I want? In the past, I’ve been fuzzy about this, and changes haven’t come.

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As I continue to confront my own issues in this area, I am encouraged by the progress I am making. What makes me feel the best, though, is understanding that if I can do it, others can too! So let’s get into it:
In A Return To Love, Marianne Williamson wrote,

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our bright light, not our darkness, that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, ‘who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and fabulous?’”

I think more of us have challenges in this area that would care to admit it. We don’t, for instance, see ourselves as being capable of being President of the United States. What in the world makes any of us any different than Abraham Lincoln, with barely a grade-school education, or <cough>Bill Clinton, from a podunk town in Arkansas?

Marianne continues,

“Actually who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small doesn’t serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It is not just in some of us; it’s in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”

“Who are you not to be?” Who am I not to be? What powerful questions! What are your answers?

As I detailed in an earlier article, the question I most often asked myself in one form or another, in times when my confidence was challenged, was essentially the same as in the first quote above: “Who am I to be [fill in the blank]?”

Unfortunately for me, my mind came up with an answer every time. Not a nice answer, either. It was an answer that reinforced my current state of mind.

“Who am I not to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous?” Doesn’t that question just feel good? What kind of answers does that bring to mind? Write them down!

So how do we raise our self-esteem?

Simple.

Feel better about yourself.

“But…but…but…” I hear you sputtering. “That is no answer!”

It really is, though. That’s all the answer you need. That’s all the answer I needed. It’s not some great cosmic mystery. It’s actually pretty easy to do. It takes perseverence and effort, and most importantly, it takes wanting to make the change.

Question: How many therapists does it take to change a light bulb?

Answer: NONE. The lightbulb will change itself when it’s ready.

Are you ready? Here are some simple steps you can take. We’ll talk more in another post about how to add some permanence to your results. But here are some things you can do initially:

1. focus on what it is you want from whatever situation you are in, and thoughts of self will fade to the background
2. live up to your own values instead of trying to measure up to others’
3. learn to see your ‘failures’ as opportunities for growing
4. list, on paper, all the positive attributes you have that you can think of
5. ask people you know well, good friends and family, to do the same
6. cultivate the conviction that your worth is based on what’s inside, rather than outer trappings of wealth, good looks. In other words, what you are, instead of what you have.
7. when feelings of inadequacy or doubt come upon you, ask a most selfish question: “Is what I’m thinking now good for me, or bad for me?”

I’ll have more for you tomorrow…

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