Project Description
Are you a passenger or are you in the driver’s seat of your own life? In any wealth journey, the role of mindset is so important. I want you to understand that once you’re clear on your vision of your future, that you can start to make it a reality today.
I want to illustrate what I mean by sharing a poem that gives me goosebumps and I hope will provoke a powerful response in you too.
It’s actually an extract from a book called A Return to Love by Marianne Williams written in 1992. I’ve never read the book. I first heard this poem at a personal development program. If you just take a moment, maybe you’re on a crowded subway or bus, maybe just tune out those sounds around you, those competing pressures and stand or sit and just read.
Our deepest fear is not that we’re inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our light, not our darkness that frightens us most. We ask ourselves, “who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?”
Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God and your playing small does not serve the world.
There is nothing enlightening about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you.
We are all meant to shine as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us, it’s in everyone.
And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.
As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.
I don’t know about you, but that I find such a powerful poem. That idea that we might be asking ourselves, “who are we to be brilliant or gorgeous or talented?” Or the concept that you might hold yourself back because of what other people think about you (ring any bells?).
And as a side-line, there might be people out there thinking unpleasant thoughts because you are brilliant and successful.
And I think social media has made that so much worse for all of us and therefore exacerbated, maybe, that fear. But in the grand scheme of things, do you really want someone who doesn’t care about you to hold you back from what you want?
I remember being told by one of my coaches that I’m like Marmite; you either like me or you don’t like me. And what he said to me is it’s better for me if I get to the point where I know that someone doesn’t like me and that’s absolutely fine, because I can just move past them in my life. And then I can focus on spending my time with the people who do like me.
Because the people who care about you matter, and the people who don’t care about you don’t matter.
- Now please ask yourself: are you brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? And I know that the answer is yes.
- Then go on and ask yourself: are you playing small? Are you holding back from what you want—again, maybe because of the fear of what other people might say?
It’s so easy, isn’t it, to find yourself in an environment where you if put your head above the parapet, someone takes a shot. Someone makes a snipe. We see this all the time.
But actually, that’s not what life is about. Life is about you playing your biggest game. You making the most of every minute, every experience, every opportunity. As the poem says, once you let your light shine, you will give permission to others to shine. And if you are a parent, playing small does not serve your children.
Letting your light shine guides the way for your children to feel brave, to live their lives, to give them the strength to know that they are brilliant and gorgeous, talented, and fabulous.
And I just love this poem. I would love you to go and read it in full please. You are brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and fabulous. Your playing small does not serve the world. It’s going to be that moment when you shine that you are going to help others shine, give them permission to do the same and liberate them from their fear as you’re liberated from yours.
So, what do you want? What’s holding you back and what will drive you forward?