The Pigeons

Today, the wind blew my tinfoil off of the air conditioner. I placed a big red bucket upside down on top of the air conditioner in hope that the pigeons will not return.

They are persistent.

I walked out on my patio to find that they are now perching in this tiny little corner behind the red bucket, and yes, still crapping on my patio. I'm going into a new phase of this bird crisis and drawing a scary face on a big paper grocery bag and putting it on the bucket. High five for pigeons being afraid of a scary face on a paper bag.

Have you ever heard that phrase? FEAR = False Evidence Appearing Real. It's something one of the gurus of personal development coined. I think it was Zig Ziglar. Meaning that more often than not, the only things we really fear in life are stories and beliefs that we create, and then we invest a ton of emotion into them until they control our actions, moods, and outcomes. Like the birds...here's to me hoping the bag scares the >>>> out of them (well not really since that's what we want to avoid on the patio)...but scares them away anyway.

I think this concept of fear shows up the most not in things like spiders or snakes, or darkness or even that fear of being alone that people talk about, but I think that this concept of fear most often shows up in ourselves. I mean that I think we fear our own selves.

"This job may not be fulfilling or what I truly am capable of, but I might not find another in the tough economic times."
"We can't break up, we've been dating for so long already, and I might not meet anyone else."
"I'm not going to write this blog, people might not read it, or I might get bad feedback."
"I'm not going to tell my boss how I really feel because he/she might be smarter than me, more experienced than me..."

ANY OF THEM...or create your own! But there it is. We are afraid to take chances on ourselves. Why? Do we lack esteem for ourselves? Do we truly believe that the excuses we make up are legitimate reasons to stop ourselves from having what we want and what we deserve? Do we spend all the time in the world questioning our hearts and that 'gut', intuitive feeling, and because of that, we never capture that momentum and that energy into the action steps?

I was taught..."Get READY! FIRE! AIM." Because too often in life when we "get ready, aim, fire." We allow the 'aim' period to take over. To take control and make room for all of that false evidence...and by the time it comes to fire. We say..."but look at all this new stuff that came to the service...all the new evidence and new circumstances that I realized while I was aiming." And then someone says to you, "But that stuff wasn't there before."

And how do you respond, "Well, I just wasn't thinking clearly." And then more often then not, we don't act at all and soften the pain of not acting with more excuses of "I guess it just wasn't meant to be." or "No big deal, something else will come up." Or...in my eyes the worst one because it means justifying a current state..."Now that I think of it, I'm fine right where I am."

It hurts becuase most of that FEAR is rooted in ourselves afraid of the future. Not being able to see past our current state. We cling on to the security of a comfort zone versus really taking a chance on ourselves and our own personal greatness. And that to me, is the biggest tragedy, because not only do we end up missing out on how great we are, but so do all of the people that we had the opportunity to impact.

Test something out for me. Build a nest by the scary face bag! What i mean by this is create a situation that you can replicate and practice the "Ready Aim Fire" and then do the "Ready Fire Aim" model and see what happens.

Example...next time you're out and you see some person you want to introduce yourself to, but wouldn't ever. Get ready and start to think about it and you'll ceck yourself out of the game. Find someone else you want to introduce yourself to, don't think about it, and JUST DO IT. And regardless of the outcome, come to realize that it wasn't all thay painful, you're not dead, you survived, and the big paper bag monster blew over with the wind.

Enjoy the night!