Last week the hubs and I went
on an early 15thanniversary trip to The Dominican Republic. It was
Ah-MAZING! I went with a few goals in mind. I wanted to connect with my
honey, rest and relax, but I also wanted to experience a breakthrough. I
wanted to come home in a better state of mind than I left, more ready to reach
my goals and experience success.
The day before we came home, we
went on an excursion to Adventure Park in Punta Cana. I highly recommend
it, the people were great! I love adventure so we chose to forego the
Segway tour and chose the extreme zipline and ropes course. They were
challenging! It’s a good thing I’ve had toddlers to carry around for the
last few years because that was the only thing contributing to my upper body
strength. It was hard, but I was working from determination and strategy.
I had a guide who would go ahead and show me what to do. He was
there if I needed him. When I struggled he would give me encouraging
words in Spanish. I may not have understood them, but I appreciated them!
I was sweaty, and tired, but pleased with my accomplishments. Then we got
to the end of the course and he said in a thick accent “Walk the plank.”
I looked around trying to figure out the next set of ropes we were going
to climb and he said, “No, no. Walk the Plank.” And he pointed to a
board, 50 feet in the air that I was supposed to jump off of. And this
time, he didn’t offer to go first. I froze!
I’ve been cliff jumping, and
bridge jumping, but at least you know you are heading into water. This
time there was nothing except me, my harness, the ground, and a really skinny
guy at the bottom saying, “I catch you.” I could feel the panic creeping
in. The guy at the bottom started tugging on my rope, and I braced myself
and pulled back. The guide I had been with gave me some nudges on my back
and I pushed back. I even tried the count to three method and just
screamed on three and still my legs did not move. This fear caught me
totally off guard. It came out of nowhere! I’d been high up off the
ground the whole day. I had been doing “scary” things all day. But
for some reason, this plank had my number. I’d wanted a breakthrough on
this trip, and it came in the form of a plank! You see this plank
paralleled exactly what I have been doing in my business and exactly my next
step in life! I LOVE coaches and mentors. I LOVE having people to
follow. I am so capable of doing hard things, and things that scare other
people. I pride myself on being willing to take every step and just keep
moving. But in that moment, on the plank, the reason my brain was
freaking out so much was because I was going to have to go first into the
unknown. There was no one to follow and study how they did it. It
was just me and I had to lead the way. I remember thinking, “Why can’t
Stephen just go first? I just need to see what I am up against.” I
knew at some point my rigging would slow down my plunge. But I didn’t
know how far I would drop before that happened. I didn’t know how fast I
would be traveling. Or how to brace myself for impact. And I was
terrified. I found the courage, made the jump and immediately thought, “That
wasn’t bad!” I should do that again!
Here’s what I learned from
being frozen in fear. I need to increase my willingness to step into the
unknown. I love having a plan and aligning with successful people to
follow. But in the past, I have slowed down my growth because I was
waiting for someone else to go first. So I’m increasing my commitment to
leading into uncharted territories. I have just announced to the world my
next step in business, and it feels a lot like standing on that plank.
Your planks are all at different levels, but you can probably relate to
my challenge. It’s easy for the guy on the ground to say, “You’ll be
fine!” That guy already knows what the jump looks like. I do this
all of the time with women trying to reach the 6 figure mark. I know you
can do it, because I’ve done it. I like being the guy on the ground! But it is
an entirely different experience being the one about to take the plunge into
the unknown.
I still had guides and support.
I still had my gear, I still had my plan. I had just come to the
point where I had to make the leap of faith. I wish I could tell you a
step by step process when you are at that point. But I imagine it’s a
little different for everyone. For me, I reminded myself that the longer
I stayed frozen the more the fear would take hold. And then I flipped the
switch from fear to faith that it would all come together. And that my
friends, is exactly what I am doing in business and in my life right now!
Who knew walking the plank could be such a good thing? For more
information : Web site: http://amywalkerconsulting.com/ .
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