This time last year, I was newly unemployed and making a major career transition. Just the thought of leaving a full-time job to start a business was enough to raise my blood pressure only a few years ago. I always admired people who fulfilled their dream of opening their own business but also thought, I could never do that. It seemed scary.
Something happened early last year. I remember the exact moment when I felt the shift from my thinking of I could never do that to I can’t wait to do that! I knew what I wanted to do next – be a coach for leaders and a trainer for organizations.
I wasn’t scared when I stepped away from my director of communications job. In fact, it felt weird how at peace I was with making such a crazy, out-of-character decision.
What led me to that shifting point?
1. I believed it was possible. I knew people who were doing a version of what I wanted to do.
2. I stopped thinking that I could never do that. The only person who was telling me I couldn’t do that was ME!
I wonder if there is something that you want to do, but you are told you can’t. Is someone else telling you that you can't or are you telling yourself you can't?
Let’s talk about the difference between prohibition and inhibition.
Prohibition is enforced restriction - someone telling you that you can't (ex. laws and rules). Probably your first thought, when you read the word ‘prohibition’, was the banning of producing and selling alcoholic beverages from 1920-1933. Americans were told they could not do something.
Inhibition, on the other hand, is a limiting belief that is usually based on fear or self-preservation. It's when you tell yourself you can't.
What are you telling yourself? Are you keeping yourself from doing what you want to do? What you dream to do?
You might find that many of the things you think you can't do are not restrictions at all. It's actually inhibition and the only person who's saying you can't is...YOU.
What are others telling you? Or, maybe you haven’t shared what you want to do with others.
I found that when I shared my new goal with others, I was fully supported and encouraged. I wasn’t told I can’t do that.
Once you figure out that you're the one in charge of your own inhibitions, then you can lower the barriers, shift your mindset, and then ask the question again, "Who says I can't?!”
What if today is your moment when you shift your thinking?