Why do so many of us lack belief in ourselves? Why do we doubt whether we can succeed in working for ourselves? How can we solve this problem and start discovering
huge power that belief in ourselves brings? Millions of people do not believe in themselves enough to achieve their dreams or goals. Many business men or women fail to achieve success because they give up too soon when they run into problems.
They do not believe enough in their own abilities or they do not believe that they deserve to achieve success.
Few have self belief of a Henry Ford who was bankrupted several times before his Ford Motor car business became a success.
I teach a martial art which encourages students to work hard and consistently to achieve their black belt. Some students drop out after two or three months but amazingly a few drop out when they are one grade away from their black belt.
I can only guess that some of these students do not believe that they deserve their black belt or they do not believe that they have ability to pass grading exam.
Some one has told them at some point in their lives that they are a pushover or a weakling or a lazy good-for-nothing. They believed that negative person and belief lodged deep in their subconscious mind. This negative view of themselves was enough to stop them even attempting to take black belt test.
Some instructors close down their schools (or fail to even open them) not because they lack skills of an instructor but because they do not believe in their abilities enough to open and promote their schools.
When I started one of my martial arts schools thirteen years ago only one student came to opening class and he had been arrested for causing grievous bodily harm to several policemen! He turned out to be one of nicest people and a great student but I could well have given up trying to start a school then and there.
Fortunately I believed from previous experience that I could succeed as a martial arts instructor and this school has now been going for 14 years.
Believing that we do not deserve success or lack necessary ability can stop us even trying. It can paralyse us so much that even smallest effort seems a waste of time. What can we do about this paralysing lack of belief?
One quick solution is to try anyway and not worry about results. When I took my black belt test in Taekwondo, I did not believe that I deserved to succeed but I thought I would take test anyway and see what happened.
Even if I had failed test I could at least have felt satisfaction of having given it a go. The real success lay in being willing to take action and to risk possibility of failure.
A couple of years ago I went to Tony Robbins' fire walk seminar held in Arena at London Docklands. I did not believe I would walk unscathed over hot coals. I took plenty of antiseptic ointment to rub on my blistered feet. I reasoned that as I weighed over eighteen stone, I would sink into glowing coals and not be able to move my feet out of danger quickly enough!
Tony's pre-fire walk talk did not help too much. He told us how on his first fire walk he did not wash down his feet after walk to get rid of any hot coals that had attached themselves to his feet. As a result he had a severe burn and when he accidentally bumped his foot against a chair, pus poured out!
He also casually mentioned that two people had died after doing firewalk at seminars not run by himself!!
As a result of all this, my belief that I would walk through fire unscathed was not strong. All words we were meant to be saying to ourselves as we did walk went out of my mind. When my time came there was no time to think. I just walked anyway.
Fortunately, walk was short and coals were not deep enough to sink in to and helpers were very quick to wash down my feet at conclusion of walk. In end I did not need antiseptic ointment. Doing walk anyway had worked.
