Day 5: Step into the mystery
Today’s confidence inspiration is from Lisa Condie, author and international entreprenuer. We’ve all heard stories of people who take a leap of faith and reinvent their lives almost overnight. They sell all their possessions, say goodbye to family and friends, and move to a new place to start a new life. We watch with awe and sometimes envy, marveling at their willingness to throw caution to the wind and follow their bliss. But we don’t always hear how the adventure turns out.
We met Lisa recently, and we can tell you that her story has turned out better than she could have predicted in her wildest dreams. She described her story to Carol and me over lunch in a local Sicilian restaurant, and we were mesmerized by her warmth, her vitality, her courage and her honesty about her experiences over the past five years.
In 2012, Lisa took a dream vacation to Italy with her daughter, and she described it as the first time she had ever felt true joy. She said that she was waiting for a taxi in a coffee shop early one morning in Rome, and made the decision in five minutes that she would return to live in Italy. She went home, sold her home and most of her possessions, closed her business, and three months later bought a one-way ticket to Florence. For the past five years, she has nurtured a private tour company in Tuscany called Find Yourself in Tuscany and written a book about her experiences, “I Found Myself in Tuscany”. Her business grew quickly and she was featured on the Today Show in 2013, and writes frequently for the Huffington Post.
"I know a lot about taking a giant leap of faith, and just having trust that your wings will sprout before you hit the ground."
“Stepping into the mystery” is one of our practices to build Spiritual Confidence. You don’t have to make a 180-degree turn to practice, but we all have places in our lives where we’ve been holding back on our dreams because of uncertainty and fear of the unknown. Maybe it’s about trying a new activity, confronting a difficult relationship, applying for a new position, starting a business, or simply committing to a new practice or breaking a habit.
For your confidence practice today:
- Identify one area in your life—small or large—where you’ve been considering a change or a new path.
- Next, identify one action you could take today that would move you in the direction of the change. Even if the action is tiny, just find the first step.
- Decide when and how you will take the first step. You can even try what are called “micromovements”—tiny little actions that move you in the direction of your pursuit. Here are some examples of micromovements:
- Want to write a book? Go to the bookstore and look for books that are already written about your topic.
- Want to find a new job? Update your LinkedIn profile today.
- Want to make more friends? Go online and see what MeetUp groups are in your area.
- Finally: As you’re journaling (from Day 4), write about the change you want to make, including how you might do it, what you think might get in the way, and how you might navigate any potential barriers. Writing about it is a micromovement itself.
That’s it. Just start, and notice how movement affects your confidence. Taking control of our own path increases our sense of independence and self-sufficiency, therefore increasing our belief in our own capabilities.
We can’t see the future, so we have to trust in our ability to manage whatever comes our way. Confidence grows as we practice “stepping into the mystery” of our lives to see what surprises our journeys present.
Thank you for continuing the Confidence Boot Camp journey with us. We can’t wait to see what tomorrow brings.
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