Yo yo yo. Welcome back to the For the Lifestyle Podcast conversations on lifestyle passions and hustles. My name's Chris, I'm your host and I'm super excited to be back here having the conversation with you, episode 183 today and we're diving straight into this. We have an amazing question that has come through, again being an anonymous question. I am absolutely and I've been saying this every week for the last probably five weeks I am absolutely loving this style because I feel like I can be my authentic self. I don't have to think about doing research. I'm not doing necessarily any. You know scripting or you know planning in advance. We just, we just have in the chat and I think that's really important because I'm sharing where I'm at, how I've experienced things of my journey, and my journey is to further my lifestyle. But I also want to help others, like you, further your lifestyle and I can only share what I know, what I've experienced, but hopefully it gives you some insight, some encouragement and some inspiration to whatever it is that you're dealing with or whatever it is your ambition is or your goals or focus, whether it is the nine to five, whether it's a side hustle or whatever it may be. Hopefully this can inspire you or encourage you and, if you know, look, if this does resonate with you, please let me know, subscribe, comment all those great things, but share it with someone. That would mean the absolute world to me.

And the question that has come through today is what fears have held you back in the past and how did you overcome them to move forward. Like that's a deep question. I'm going to say it again and then we're going to roll the intro and we're going to dive straight into it what fears have held you back in the past and how did you overcome them to move forward? Let's get into it. Look, when I think about, you know, fears that have held me back in the past, the first thing that I can think of that comes straight off the chest is letting go, then the other one being, you know, fear of missing out and also fear of what other people would think. Now, if we think about the first one, letting go, there's been a few elements of this, which has probably been in the more recent than in the prior, but I guess I first experienced this when I was in a management role, working at my income, consulting, and I had a team, and letting go and putting that trust in someone else to do something, didn't probably realize the power of letting go until I started working for myself and the freedom that it gives. You know, outsourcing things, outsourcing the washing, outsourcing listings, outsourcing my photography, but even this podcast. I have someone that now helps, you know, do the edits of these and I was so scared in doing that. And the person that's editing this, I appreciate you. The individual I'm not naming names because I don't know if they want to be known whatever but how much I appreciate that now has been 10x fold of how I kind of looked at it or understood it prior to being able to let go. But that's the side of delegation.

I think the other component of letting go is just letting go of the challenges and the social norms and pressures, and that kind of ties into the elements of trying to impress other people or not being able to live up to other people's expectations or not being good enough or fear of not being good enough or fear of not. I don't know. It's really weird. The more I think about it it's so silly. But I think that that's the other struggle is when I do think about, you know, impressing other people. Why should it matter? And coming back to the letting go point, is I've been able to just let go and come out of my shell a bit more Again, stepping away from a nine to five perspective and really just going into building something that I want. Before I could kind of really be. When I say successful, I mean successful in being able to execute with confidence. I had to deal with a lot of doubt, I had to deal with a lot of confidence issues, even with imposter syndrome, and I still have that today, but it's nowhere near as evident and nowhere near as consistent. But letting go of all those things, because those things that hold me back they're pointless, they're all in my own head and they're all projections and they're all from fear of maybe not reaching the unstated expectations of other people, and those other people don't really care, a hundred percent don't care. So there's there's that component of it as well and I'll dive into that a little bit more.

But the other thing that I wanted to touch on was, you know, the fear of missing it. I've always been one that, like you know, when it comes to different things occurring or events, or you know, whether it's pokemon or buying something there has been this tendency to have this FOMO, fear of missing out and again trying to pull that away, because I think it all ties back to, you know, trying to have a status or trying to have or, you know, make my ego feel good, or to be able to say, hey, look look at me. But I think the sooner I realized that no one cares and this is easier said than done and it's still a component which I struggle with but the sooner you realize and the sooner I have been able to realize that when we think people care about you not necessarily care about you. When you think people are thinking about you in the way that you think they're thinking about you, they're not really, because everyone has their own problems.

And I was chatting to a good friend the other day and I was kind of challenging them about. You know, they've got all these goals and ambitions, which is great Like you should have goals and ambitions and getting so focused on a time period of that these should be completed by. And they were saying, oh, I want to have this by this age because, you know, I want the status, I want the level, you know, and I feel like things will be better by them. And I was challenging it because if you're trying to do it to impress other people, especially if you're doing it against peers, people at the same age of you and maybe you went to high school together and you've both been trying to you know first. You know, get married first or have your house first, or you know, have a hundred thousand dollars or, I don't know, get a new car or whatever it is.

The mentality is is like you're, you know, competing against each other to impress each other or a broader audience, whether it's on socials or whatever, and when you don't hit it you feel crap. When you do hit it, at the end of the day, that person is not necessarily going to respect you anymore. At the end of the day, that person is not necessarily going to respect you anymore. They're going to be actually probably more likely, jealous of you and then really have resentment against you. I'm generalizing, 100% generalizing, but that's what I have tend to.

There's a lot of, especially in Australia. There's this culture of tall poppy syndrome. A lot of people don't want you to succeed. They want to see you fail, and I've seen that a lot sharing on YouTube with my journey. There's people that I find the best people that support me are the ones that don't comment, the ones that sit behind the scenes and just watch and then, out of nowhere, they send me a message or say have been watching you. This is amazing and that blows my mind. It's the people that sit behind their computer desks or their phones and feel like they have the right I mean, everyone has a right to an opinion but they have the, I guess, the respect to be able to tell me how to live my life. And when you rid of the people that are trying to drive your life, you'll be so much better off.

That's a different conversation. So let's get back to fear. So I think you know the fear of letting go really comes down to probably vulnerability, and it comes down to that fear and failure of growth because you know, I'm giving it to someone else. There's that whole saying of if you want something done, right, you know you got to do it yourself. That's not always true, right, we think we know how to do it the best because that's what we know, but at the end of the day, we're not really as good as we think we are. I think doing that makes a huge thing and then, as you start to do that, you will build a level of mental resilience that enables you to think differently, because all of a sudden, a problem that you had is no longer your problem. It's someone else's problem, and if they're doing it well, then there's nothing to think about. You move on from it, right? And a lot of this is an open discussion. Like it's not discussed on an open basis.

When I say what I'm talking about and I haven't discussed it openly, I've probably spoken more about it here on the podcast than anyone else, but you know, the fear of failure has also been a big driver of the fears that I've had, right. You know the fear of failure has also been a big driver of the fears that I've had, right. You know what if it doesn't work out? What if I'm not able to do it? You know I took a chance on myself four years ago to leave the job and to build this, build the podcast and start my own business, and I went through the process of what's the worst that can happen I have to get another job or I have to go back. What's the best thing that can happen is I'll have the best time of my life and I am having the best time of my life, and it's weird that we get so stuck on fear of failure when really you've just got to step over a couple of stepping stones, maybe a hundred stepping stones, to the success that you want to see, but we're too scared that we're going to fall in. But if you fall in the water you can probably swim, you can probably manage to get through it. Right, it's not the end of the world. So getting past some of those barriers are going to be actually super key in helping you get past whatever those fears are and you know, for me I think it really just does really come down to probably a whole bunch of just thinking on the fly here, maybe psychological drivers of, maybe, whether it's I spoke about imposter syndrome and I'm not being good enough, or I'm feeling like I'm not reaching my limits, or I'm not being my best version of myself, which is, you know, crap.

That's not true. I am trying to constantly be my best version of myself, but it comes back to tall poppy syndrome. It comes back to, you know, maybe letting the negativity come into my life and creep in, and I don't think you know thinking about it. I think another common thing that people probably experience is rejection or fear of rejection. I haven't experienced this too much because I haven't needed to ask so much, and I've started to learn that you know now the best thing you can do is ask, because if you get rejected, nothing changes, like you're still in the same situation. If someone says yes, then you know the opportunity starts. So I've never struggled with that. Maybe, you know, maybe if it's a situation of you know asking for permission versus you know asking for forgiveness, but that's a different conversation, right, and this is probably going to be different across. You know different age groups. Whoever's listening, you know if you're younger than me or older than me, but I can't really speak for that because I can only really speak of myself.

I'm a millennial and I think for me it really comes down to this underachievement mentality and it comes down to I've always been pushed into balancing my career with life expectations and how do I make sure that everything is the best of what the world wants that to look like? Stuff the world, what the world wants that to look like. You know, stuff the world, what the world wants it to look like, what do you want it to look like? And I think that's how I've dealt with it is now that I've been able to let go of those norms in a corporate world, but also the societal expectations that come into that. You know, I remember people saying to me because I work in the city and because I'm earning a lot of money, I should have a better car. But like why, that doesn't make sense to me. And fortunately I, you know I was strong against that because why should I have a nice car just for the sake of having a nice car? It doesn't make sense. But that was someone else's mentality of oh, you're to be successful, you needed to have those things. Just bizarre. But you know everyone has their different ways of thinking. So I think that's that component of it.

The other thing which I think maybe is a bit of a different way of looking at how I've been able to move forward from these things is in the past I have been really stuck with what do you call it? Paralysis of analysis. I overthink a lot of things. Now I try to back it up with data and I've always been a numbers guy. I've always loved looking at data. But there's been sometimes sometimes scared to make a decision because I'm scared of the outcome. But now I'm getting better at it because I'm the one driving the ship. When it's someone else, when you make a decision on the behalf of someone else, that's where it probably scares me a lot more. And either the other tie into that is probably the fear of judgment. You know I spoke about that already worrying about what other people think or what their opinions. And you know, in the last four years I've probably had more opinions from other people than I have had in the entirety of my life.

Just because I'm out here doing my own thing, I'm not earning as much as other people. I'm doing things differently. I'm living the life the way I want to live it, and that makes people uncomfortable, whether it's their own issues or projections or struggles that they've dealt with, or because they want to feel bigger and better. And if you want to feel bigger and better, good on you. If you're earning more money than me, whoop-dee-doo.

At the end of the day, it really comes down to happiness. Are you happy with where you are and what you're doing and how you're progressing forward? If you can achieve that, then the fear starts to just disappear, because what are you worrying about anymore? I used to worry about getting to a certain level, being at a certain status in a career, earning a certain amount of money. Those aren't my priorities now. My priority now is how do I build a business that's going to suit my lifestyle for the next, you know, five, 10 years to then enable my years after that? That's the only focus and you know I've I've seeked a lot of inspiration from you, know other people and seeing how other people have created their lifestyles.

That you want, and a lot of the people have said, when you look at, you know, many of the great people is, you know, look at who you want to be in the future and start being that person today, start working towards it. Right, it does take incremental steps, but that's how you overcome it and as you overcome those small steps of maybe a fear or issues or struggles that you have, it gets a little bit easier and you gradually build more confidence. That's essentially it, right. But you know, I think the big challenge here and I still struggle with it, but I'm getting less of it, but it's probably the big point that I wanted to bring back to everyone is the power of external influence that people have on us, like whether it's media and social norms or all those different things right, all these unrealistic portrayals of success or what perfection looks like, and it intensifies these fears that we don't realize we have because, subconsciously, all of a sudden saying, in order to be this, you have to have that, or you need to do this, or you need to have done that and all those different things. And it's ridiculous. It is really ridiculous.

So if you can tap out of that and identify where those are coming from, like the roots, like why do you want to be doing what you're doing? Why are you pursuing the success stories that you're pursuing? Why do you want to have this by 30? Why do you want to have that by 25? Why do you want to have that by 25? Why do you want to be that person? Why do you want to have that job? Where's that come from? Is that your purpose? Is that what you want? Is it going to give you the fulfillment that you want? Or is it because someone has pushed that onto you and projected that onto you?

So I challenge you to challenge that, because the fear that you may have and that I've had is because it's been built onto me that if I don't do this, I'm not going to be good enough. Who's defining this good enough? You need to define the good enough right. So I think you know to really bring it back home is, for me it's really come down to just one identifying and getting out, looking outside of the box of what you know now and really zooming out and understanding is like has the world that you're currently living in, has that been pre-planned by yourself? Or is there so much sides of the boxes? Is there the meat within the box? Has that been co-developed by other people?

And what I mean by that is the way you think, the way you do things and the reasons why you have fear. Is it the fear of letting go? Is it the fear of what people will think? Is it the fear of missing out? Is it the fear of not being good enough? Is it the fear of failure? Is it the fear of confidence? Is it the fear of success? Is it the fear of you know, I don't know just not being good enough? Where does that come from? And I reckon I can pretty much guarantee that it stems from other people putting these preconceived notions or these preconceived ideas of how things must be done, and that's because that's how they've always done it or because who you surround yourself with. And that's why it's important to have really good support networks, because, depending on who your family and friends are and mentors, and who the people are dealing with these things, that's going to influence on how you deal with these things.

So you need to make sure you do zoom out and just understand why you're doing these things. Like, really understand it, take some time and dig into it and understand. If that's why you're doing it, does that align to where you want to be in 10 years? And I know that's a long time to think. But if you want to be somewhere when you're 30, why? And then what happens next? Like, why are you trying to achieve this? Why are you rushing towards that when really you might not even know what you want? You just think that's what you want because that's what you've always been told. So I also want to appreciate and understand that.

You know fear is, it's, universal to all of us. We all experience it in different ways, some of us really openly, some of us, you know, we hide it and sometimes it's going to be physical, sometimes it's going to be emotional, psychological, all these different things. You know, be kind to yourself, take time to figure this out For me. I'm being open about it because I'm now confident that I'm working through it better and that you know the fears that I have now is that you know, maybe I'm not going to hit the target that I want to hit in my business. Why do I want to hit that? Because, really, if I hit it, it means that we're growing. If I don't hit it, we're not growing. And why do I want to grow the business? If I can grow the business, it means that I'm able to provide more opportunities to myself and to my you know, to my family, to my loved ones, and to hit the targets in terms of milestones, of where I want to be able to do. I don't want to work as much right, I'm building my business with more and more people in it to take me out of it so that I can go focus on some other dreams and goals and aspirations that I have. But that takes time and it just might mean that if I don't hit those things, it's going to take a little bit more time. It's really not the end of the world.

Be kind to yourself, talk to someone about this. I would love to know what you know for you. Ask the question to you what fears have you held back in the past and how did you overcome them to move forward, or how are you overcoming them to move forward? I hope this is a deep conversation. There's a lot in this. But I hope this is a deep conversation. There's a lot in this, but I hope it's been helpful, I hope it's been meaningful for you, and I love having these conversations with you.

So if it's inspired you, if it's encouraged you, or if you found something insightful, let me know down below in the comments. Please like, subscribe all those great things and if this did resonate with you, please, please, share it with someone who you think needs to hear this, because, at the end of the day, you know I'm here trying to further my lifestyle, but I also want to encourage others to further your lifestyle, like I want you to do better, right, because you can and bring out the best version of yourself. So if we can help more and more people do that, we will have a better place to live and a better place of who is around us. So that's really, you know, really a big goal there as well. So appreciate you being here. You have a wonderful day, Cheers.