I recently wrote a piece on accepting that you are good enough.
As great as that concept can be I know a lot of guys immediately think something like:
“If I accept things are enough why would I push on with anything in life?”
Or
“My pain and anger are a key driver to my success”
It is totally reasonable for guys to think this way, after all “not good enough” has driven them to this point.
What I want to say is that I hear you, but it becomes a self created ceiling and there is another way to be.
I worked with an Olympic athlete in London, they had a huge house, a perfect family, health, money and medals and peer recognition, yet here they were, in front of me describing how deeply unhappy they were and how numb they felt to all their success.
They were driven by a tough childhood and they believed that drove them to create their success. To prove everyone wrong.
I asked them if now they had proved everyone wrong, had they proved it to themselves?
They broke down and had a huge breakthrough, see although they were driven by their not good enough, it became a belief.
So when they won medals, had a family or immense wealth the person receiving it still wasn’t ENOUGH. So they couldn’t enjoy it, they couldn’t feel it because in their subconscious mind they were doing all these things to prove they were enough without addressing their belief within themselves that they wern’t.
Whether the door closed to the bedroom of their childhood home or in their London mansion, the same brain was there still dealing with feeling like they wern’t enough.
I want you to imagine two separate paths to success, both will get you there, but one is driven by pain and feeling not enough, you throw yourself into work to prove your value, you provide for your family to show you’re enough, earn more right? You struggle and grind and slog more than anyone, that’s how you get to the top. However you still feel alone and not enough.
The second path is one of power, you know you are good enough so no longer have to prove it. You make choices knowing you are enough and the outcome of them won’t affect that. You connect with your wife and children everyday. You get to go for opportunities knowing no matter the outcome you are enough. It is a path without fear.
Both will get you to success.
Which one are you willing to walk?