"Be brave for one minute."
Fear is a paralyzer of potential.
Sometimes, all it takes to break the spell is to be brave for one minute.
At a speaker conference recently, one of my colleagues, Joe Mull, was delivering a keynote from the main stage.
He talked about fear.
First, it was about his reluctance to incorporate different elements - specifically, singing - into his speech, despite his passion for song and his extensive theater background.
And then, he turned the conversation to his 11-year old daughter.
He mentioned that she wanted to audition for a school musical, but she was nervous about the idea of standing in front of a room of people and singing all by herself during the audition.
For a couple days before the audition, she was tense and not sure if she wanted to follow through on it.
Joe then said to her, “All you have to do is sing for one minute. You just need to be brave for one minute.”
Ultimately, she sucked it up and went ahead with the audition - and guess what?
She got the part.
And guess what else?
His daughter joined him on stage and they did a duet in front of a delighted crowd, including me:
This whole story was tugging hard at my heartstrings as I sat in the ballroom watching this beautiful moment between father and daughter unfold in front of me.
It lit a fire under my ass, too.
It was inspiring to watch an 11-year-old feel the fear and do it anyway.
She was brave for that one minute, and doors were now open to her.
And, that experience serves as a tremendous confidence booster moving forward, so when faced with another scary proposition, the confidence gained in facing previous fears will serve to slay the ones that follow.
Although I have many years on her, this is still a lesson that I’m grappling with each day.
And my guess is that many of you need to be reminded of it, as well.
Fear holds us back from what could potentially be, and it sucks when you allow it to win.
But, if you hold strong for just one minute, that breaks through the paralyzing power of fear long enough for you to make it to the other side. The results of that effort are important, sure, but a major battle was won simply by following through.
For example, I’ve been working on some next steps to my business and am looking for advice, so I’ve been reaching out to busy colleagues for help, which makes me really uncomfortable to do.
I feel like I’m imposing on their time and I really, really hate that feeling.
As a way to feel the fear and do it anyway, I’ve ended up muttering the “be brave for one minute” mantra to myself as I send out the emails to set up these calls, and I’ve gotten through my list, while also thinking of other folks to contact.
While this is a small victory in the grand scheme, it’s a victory, nonetheless, and I’ll take what I can get :)
After all, little victories lead to bigger ones.
And where I come from, that’s called progress :)
Over to you…
Is there something that you’ve been avoiding recently, and need to “be brave for one minute” to get over the hump? What is it? Share your story in the comment section below.