Don’t be too timid and squeamish about your actions. All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better. -Ralph Waldo Emerson
The power to change your own destiny lies within you. Whatever you want to achieve or create in your life lies within your power. How you will go about it totally rests on what you are willing to do to achieve it.
Many times we think we need help from others to achieve our desires, but the reality is no one out there can do this for you. It will be up to you to make the choices, draw up the plans and work your way toward your destiny. Sometimes you might need people’s help, but they can only help you when you already have an idea about what you want.
OWN YOUR DECISIONS
The more you overthink the less you will understand. -Habeeb Akande
Sometimes it gets hard, and this is usually because of self-doubt which has been unconsciously ingrained in our minds. When trying to make a decision about something, we are often plagued with self-doubt. We are constantly thinking and rethinking our decisions, distrusting in our own abilities. We do this until we end up casting aside the idea, deciding the venture would be fruitless, without even trying.
If this is you, you might need to find out the how this self-deprecating attitude and thoughts came about.
As a teenager, I was very insecure and thought I could handle it by hiding behind people who were loud and more outgoing than I was. I was always so afraid of what people would think of me, that I was never really free to be my true self. I made friends with and tried being like the opinionated kids, I thought were cool at the time. To be accepted by them, I essentially had to kiss butts most of the time. I became a people pleaser, buried my own self and quite successfully imitated the actions of the kids I admired.
I can tell you now, that those weren’t the happiest years of my life. This was because I was forced to be who I was not, for the sake of being accepted.
I am much older now and even though I still have my insecurities, I no longer let it dictate who I am or what I should do, and I can confidently say I’m living my best life at the moment. It’s perfectly okay if someone doesn’t like me, after all it isn’t everyone who has good taste. What matters is, I like me. There’s nothing harder than living a life where you smile and nod while wondering, why the hell am I even friends with this person?
Another significant problem that many of us have, is that we have taken other people’s flawed opinions or perceptions of ourselves and accepted it. We have internalized what their thoughts about us, believing it to be the truth about who we are.
I want to let you know that, the only opinion that should matter to you, is the one you make of yourself. It should be your own opinion that should affect your mood or drive your self-image and your life. What you make out of life will be determined by how you see yourself and what you think of yourself. Depending on validation from others will only end up diminishing your own self-worth, and you should never let yourself be a slave to someone’s opinion.
OWN YOUR WORTH
Accept who you are, except you are a serial killer – Ellen DeGeneres
When your self-worth has been damaged by what others think about you, you will find it difficult to feel good about yourself. You will wallow in self-doubt and second guess everything you do. It is only when you let go of these wrong ideas about yourself and own who you truly are, that you can begin to live your best life.
Is there a way to regain your self-worth and confidence in yourself? You might ask. I am pleased to let you know that there is. To explain this, I will need you to perform a simple and practical exercise.
I want you to close one hand in a tight fist, and keep making it tighter and tighter until it begins to hurt. Now, this is what happens when you hold on to something for very long, it begins to hurt.
Here’s the first question. Who feels the pain? Is it felt by you who is holding the fist, or is it felt by someone else?
Of course, it is felt by you, who is holding it in. This simply illustrates that if you hold on to all these negative thoughts about yourself, it will be you who gets hurt in the long run.
Now the second question, who has the responsibility to get rid of the pain? This should be a straightforward answer as it is no one else, but you who can get rid of the pain.
You can open your fist and release the tension in your hand. Do you feel relaxed as you let it all go? Take a deep breath as you let all the pent-up tension within you go. You owe it to yourself to let it all go.
OWN YOUR LIFE
If you don’t know where you’re going, any road’ll take you there – George Harrison
You are in charge of the direction your life takes, and you have a responsibility to steer it in a direction that leads to your fulfillment and well-being.
You are in command of your thoughts and emotions. You do not blame others for the way they treat you since you assume ownership of co-creating every experience in your life.
Take charge of your thoughts and emotions, and do not blame anyone for how they treat you. This is because you are partly in charge of creating every experience in your life. Blaming doesn’t solve much, instead focus your energy on being positive, learning new things and taking the necessary actions that drive you towards your success.
Visualize the reality you want for yourself and work towards it. When you continuously practice creative visualization, your thoughts and imaginations will become reality. Create a vision of what you want to become, where you want to reach and it will become reality. Creative visualization engages the mind which in turn engages the body to assist you in fulfilling your desires.
Be willing to step outside your comfort zone once in a while; take the risks in life that seem worth taking. The ride might not be as predictable if you’d just planted your feet and stayed put, but it will be a heck of a lot more interesting. Edward Whitacre, Jr.
It is important to note that in reaching your desired outcome, you will have to leave your comfort zone. You will have to leave what you are familiar with and undertake tasks which are demanding. It can be scary dabbling into the unfamiliar, but it is in doing this that you learn and gain the experience you will need to succeed.
It doesn’t matter where you are today, what really matters is where you want to reach. Don’t make friends because you feel lonely, make friends because you have so much love and enthusiasm to share. Don’t marry because you feel lonely, marry because you have so much love and care to share.
Let me tell about a story of a drowning person. There was a person drowning in a river…people around were shouting for help. Suddenly one person jumped in the river, everyone still shouting and encouraging the person who jumped in water. So that brave person saved the life of the drowning person. When he came out of the river, he could feel the sense of achievement, but somehow, he was bit angry too., As soon as he came out he shouted back on the crowd…everything is fine but first tell me who pushed me in the river.
Now let me do the characterization of all the roles in this story. The person jumped to save the life was me. Person who pushed me was my mentor, my guru, my god. They always push you in hard situations so that we have that experience and know how to come out of that situation. The person who was drowning was also me, but people around me were only shouting, giving directions, telling there opinion, but no one jumped in water to help. It is a matter of taking first step. Only you can save yourself in this entire universe. No one else can take you out of ocean of troubles.
You are the only one who can take yourself to where you want to be. Own it all up.
