Tony Note: Here’s a partial excerpt from Chapter 4 from the NEW Anniversary edition of the book, Mind Capture: How to Awaken Your Entrepreneurial Genius in a Time of Great Economic Change.
WHAT DETERMINES, SHAPES, AND INFLUENCES your own fear factor?
There are several things, but here are a few vital clues:
- What you watch, read and say to others
- What you’ve learned and believe
- What you think about the most
- What questions you ask
- What you do and the actions you take
- With whom you associate
So what do I mean by ‘fear factor’? I’m not referring to the once popular TV show where physical skill and ability to gross out the audience by eating insects was packaged and sold as skill and entertainment, but something much more important. First, here’s what I mean by fear factor: How you approach, handle and respond to risk whether real or imagined.
Everyone experiences fear. The challenge when fear presents itself is the game your mind begins to play. Your self-talk will begin to either support you or bring you down. Most people, when presented with an opportunity or fresh idea, will begin to shoot it down and come up with a list of reasons it can’t be done, may not work or is simply “too risky.” With the rapid changes in the economy and work, many of the old rules of engagement and thinking need to be thrown out the door.
The glaring problem most people have in the pursuit of their inner genius, and I base this on how few people within society are living fully engaged and on purpose, is that their inside and outside mental programming causes them to focus and default back to worst case scenarios over and over. Sadly, they often have no idea they’re even doing it.
Deflecting opportunities is a horrible habit to possess. Buried below the layers of negative behavior and programming, opportunity is sadly a foreign word in most people’s vocabulary. I believe that fear is the silent, yet #1, enemy to most people on their journey to a life of significance. It’s a convenient and comfortable trick of the mind which sets up the next dangerous habit known as excuse making. Fear and excuse making are closely linked together.
The Three Primary Fear Peddlers You Must Be On Guard to Defend From Stealing Your Mind and Your Inner Genius
- The media
- Your associations
- The marketplace
Let’s take a closer look at these three areas where many fear peddlers congregate and identify key distinctions to help bullet-proof your mind and flush out toxic programming.
#1. The media. This should be an obvious one, yet far too many people diminish the media’s influence on the mindset and ability to shape public opinion. The old adage in media rooms of “if it bleeds it leads” has taken over and dominates most news outlets. It’s simply amazing to watch how news has been twisted into not only gossip and entertainment but also a forum to complain, plant fear (swine flu anyone?) and focus much more time than should be allowed on what’s wrong with society, real or imagined, and rarely on what we’re doing well.
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