The other evening I was invited to speak at a ladies networking event, it’s something that I love to do from time to time and as this was the first time this event had had speakers I was more than happy to participate. After we’d all had a drink and a chat, we sat down for some introductions, however, there were over 30 of us in total so that took some time and this was then followed by another speaker who was before me. I would like you now to imagine the scene, a room full of women mostly over the age of 35, sat for a reasonable amount of time chatting and with water on table. You’ve guessed it, by the time it was my turn to speak I was desperate for the ladies! Now for me this is a no brainer, I was confident that a small comfort break wouldn’t be an issue, in fact it may well be welcome by many in the room – so a quiet word was made to the organiser, and with moments there was a small stampede led by me, to the ladies.
Now you might be thinking what has this got to do with feeling good (apart from the obvious!) well, what followed got me thinking. A number of ladies came up to me during the break and expressed how grateful they were for me saying something because they too were desperate to go, but didn’t want to say anything, cause a fuss or disrupt the evening.
I reflected on this for a moment and I wondered how many times do we not want to say or do something, we don’t want to put up our hands, or disrupt the status quo for fear of what others may think, or fear of the future or fear of getting it wrong even for something that we either believe in or that would make us feel better or live a better life? How many of you have had to sit in discomfort, unhappy or frustrated wishing that you had taken action when the opportunity arose? I find it really interesting, even with the smallest of things (like needing the toilet) how we can create a negative story about it, that holds us back from taking that step towards feeling better, from being embarrassed for being the only one, to causing a scene, to wondering what people would think; we create a whole world of make believe around us, when in fact, in reality, none of those things are true, our worst fears are rarely realised and often the exact opposite is true!
And how simply beautiful our lives would be if more and more we recognised when we were doing this and were able to take the action we needed, when we needed to take it, free from stories that create fear or worry, taking us closer to the things we wanted to achieve and the lives we wanted to create.
So the next time you feel the need to take action, but don’t, take a moment to observe the story that is holding you back and imagine a life where that story doesn’t exist and see how different it feels.
with love
Andrea x
