If ever the fear of embarrassment has stopped you from doing something… (Read this)

Sam was not the most fortunate of boys, or that’s what he thought.

What are your limiting beliefs ?

Sam was nifty and clever, he was an average student or so he thought, he wanted to study finance despite his efforts he was not being able to score, he blamed his family, his life, his situation for it. But he had the books, a pen, shelter and food to keep him going. Sam had the resources, he just did not have the beliefs.

Sam never thought he could do as well as his friends in software designing, when he started getting interested in computers, it was too late or so he thought. He thought he would make loads of mistakes embarrass himself, so he stopped trying all together. Sam could see the future. Or so he thought.

Sam was an outgoing person, one day a teacher approached him to MC in an event. He said MCing is not for me, do not get me wrong he wanted to do it. Just that the initial fear of embarrassing himself was much much much stronger than his ability to realize perhaps his secrets wishes to become a media personality could become true because of it. Sam thought MC is not for him…so he thought and he thought and he thought…alot of things. Adding to his list of limiting beliefs.

 Sam knew that he could not do or be a lot of things before trying. No, he did not have a time machine to see the outcome of his actions, nor he could not see the future, but he still believed his limiting beliefs so much so that now it became his reality. A reality that would keep him safe from embarrassment or so he thought. He knew this because he saw others fail and succeed and the fear of failure was much greater than the joy of proving yourself wrong. The stakes were high; he would refrain from doing anything he thought he could not do. Because that is so much easier than trying, sure Sam will never try new things, he will never fail, he will never know what it is like to prove you wrong. He will only remember that he never embarrassed himself for trying, because that is the biggest thing in this world for anybody. Or so he thought. 

Be like a kid, get involved

As kids we are so involved in everything, but as we grow we believe that we need to stick to what we know, because of the fear of embarrassment. That is what we are protecting ourselves from the small, mere, silly  chance of embarrassment and in return forgetting our wishes or dreams ? How are you supposed to be better at something when the first chance of you not mastering it, you give up? Is mastery and innate talent the only way you get something in life? Does practice not count? It does. We are just too afraid to practice cause out of every 1000 practice, we might fail and embarrass ourselves once. And that is not worth it right?

Brain teaser: What was the most embarrassing thing someone else did ?

Now, here is a brain teaser for you: What was the most embarrassing thing you did in your life? Here comes the long list of cringe worthy times. Now, here is another question “what was the most embarrassing thing someone else did?” This is hard is it not? Why is that? It is because people essentially are selfish beings; we care for others but not as much as we care for ourselves. We think a lot about “how someone perceives us”, but rarely about " how others perceive others”. Its simple people may laugh at your embarrassment and failure but they will not consider you important enough to remember it.

Morale of Sam’s story is emerge from that limiting belief you have held on to, as ground breaking as it may sound no one cares if you embarrassed yourself. Was that mean? Sometimes the truth hurts.