Limiting Your Own Potential

If you’ve heard me speak, you’ve probably heard me share one of my favorite quotes from a passage in a book by Marianne Williamson called A Return to Love. She says; “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light not our darkness that most frightens us.” It inspires me because often we try to blame our shortcomings on outside forces. It’s much easier to… than risking putting ourselves to a great test.

My friend Jason King from PEJ Events in Austin, Texas, recently sent me Emmanuel Acho’s most recent book, Illogical - Saying Yes to a Life Without Limits. In the book, Acho challenges a belief I’ve held true for many years. In a chapter titled, “Goals are Dumb”, he suggests that setting goals is the biggest misconception of achievement. After reading this, I almost put the book down until the next line read; “Before you shut the book out of pure shock at that notion, let me explain.”

I have a firm belief that we should continually challenge our assumptions. Sometimes we get so ingrained in what we believe and trying to prove we are right, that we practice confirmation bias by only seeking out information that validates what we believe. It’s powerful to ponder if those beliefs still hold true from time to time and potentially expand our minds and understanding. This was exactly what happened as I kept reading.

I’ve long been a proponent of the importance of goal setting. It was a lesson I learned at a young age - to set goals, write them down, measure your progress and achieve them. It has served me well over the course of my life. Yet as I continued reading, I realized that while the goals have been helpful, they may have also been a factor in limiting my potential.

Acho says; “At best a goal puts a ceiling on our achievement, often preventing us from dreaming of something greater or different. At worst, constant goal setting and failure to reach those goals threaten our self-efficacy and self-esteem….The mind is incredibly powerful; when you set a goal, your brain will work toward that goals, but just that goal. Don’t set a goal, have an objective with no limitations.”

The similarities of mibe (make it better everyday) and an “objective with no limitations” was not lost on me. The idea of making progress toward something great instead of focusing on a destination has long been a blueprint for our success at Footers. Personally though I realized, I’ve been judging myself too much on achieving a goal or falling short. In those cases where I didn’t meet my goal I deemed the effort a failure discounting any progress that I actually did make. And as for the cases where I did achieve what I set out to do - I am starting to realize that the bar I set might have been too low and…..gulp….. possibly me being afraid of my own light.

HEART LEADERSHIP WORKSHOP

August 15th-17th, 2022

Back again by popular demand, we are creating one last opportunity in 2022 for those who missed this unforgettable
3-day experience to find community, strength,
and Heart Leadership skills!