What bold action is needed to move your business forward? What risk do you need to take to grow as a person?
Sometimes we don’t analyze cognitively or purposefully what bold action we need to take. Sometimes we just intuitively know that if we decide to make something happen that it will be the right move.
I took a risk today. I undertook a bold action. I put myself out there. I set myself up for rejection.
I cannot yet tell you if the risk I took will result in my desired outcome. But you know what? It felt good to take the risk. Because here is what I know. Whether or not what I want to happen in fact does happen, I have already caused a major shift to occur. Simply by choosing to make the bold move, I have changed the landscape and my future in it.
How does this work?
Here’s what I know. The better part of succeeding is getting past fear. If there is no fear, then there really is no risk! In the absence of fear, confidence blossoms. That sense of confidence may be fact-based or intuitive or, preferably, both. It doesn’t matter. When you have it – confidence – you are willing and able to take bold action.
I’ve been taking bold action almost daily for months now as I construct a framework for people to grow personally and grow their businesses in the form of this association of and for entrepreneurs. And I think it’s getting easier. Taking risks and bold actions, I think, must be a habit you can cultivate. It not only becomes easier the more frequently you do it, it becomes second nature.
It’s like exercising a muscle. At first you resist exercising for fear it might be uncomfortable. Then you make yourself do it and and, lo and behold, you feel better for having done it. After the exhilaration wears off, you wonder if it it was really worth the effort, because now you’re suffering repercussions from your decision to exercise – your body is sore! And besides, you haven’t seen any real result from all that effort. Your abdomen isn’t noticeably flatter and you haven’t lost a pound. And you know if you do it one more time, you’re likely to have the same non-results. Aah! But if you begin to exercise every day, or at least regularly, something magical happens. Your muscles grow stronger and your ability to exercise longer, harder and with tangible results becomes easier! So it is with risk-taking.
I don’t know if I made my point about how risk-taking gets easier the more you do it, but I think I may have talked myself into exercising more often.
Anyway, to bring this all home, I don’t know if I will get what I took the risk today to try to get. But I do know that, even if I don’t get it, I will have another opportunity at that brass ring. And, perhaps, an even better opportunity awaits. And, most importantly, because my risk-taking and bold action-taking muscles have been freshly exercised, I am in shape to identify new opportunities and to take swift, confident action toward them.
So, what bold action is needed to move your business forward? What risk do you need to take to grow as a person?