8 Tricks to Overcome Discouragement
By: Lisa Ryan
Tags: Success, Sad, Healthy Habits, Tips And Tricks, Overcoming Obstacles

We all need encouragement from time to time. When the doubts start to set in, you start asking yourself things like, “Who do I think I am?” Your brain starts coming up with all sorts of reasons why you should keep yourself small and hide back in the cave where you REALLY belong. Don’t you dare! It’s NOT true!

Here are the 8 tricks you can use to get a boost and overcome discouragement:

1. Spend Time With People Who Believe in You

Why hang around with Debbie Downers? Instead, go out with positive people who think all things are possible. Because they are! Keep the negative friends, and the friends who might be jealous or threatened by you, at bay. They’re confidence sappers. That’s their problem, not yours, and you don’t need it right now.

2. Expect Success

Ever hear of the Laws Of Attraction? I think there’s a lot of truth in them. Positive energy attracts more positive energy. So KNOW that you’re going to make it, and make it BIG! KNOW your relationship will be ridiculously great and it will be! If you expect good things, you will absolutely get more of them in your life.

3. Aim High

Aim so high that you will need two lives to fit it all in! This past year, I had a client in her 50s in my office. She is quite accomplished. Remarkable achievements, actually. But she was down in the dumps because she had already “checked all the boxes with everything on her list.” Those were her exact words. She no longer had purpose because she felt like she had completed everything by 56, and had nothing more to build, become, contribute, or work toward. After just four sessions, she got her mojo back by building a new and completely different set of goals. For me, it was like watching a rocket launch! So aim high, and always restore your goals each time your previous ones have been accomplished.

4. Dream BIG

Imagine yourself, super successful, ten years from now. Twenty. Thirty years from now! Can you see it? Maybe you’re married to the greatest guy in the world! Or you’re spending time in your second home in the mountains. Is that an award you’re receiving? Your daughter’s wedding perhaps? Or maybe you’re sitting in a classroom, a board room, or on a beach towel in the islands. Imagine it, expect it, and it will happen.

5. Build on Your Strengths

We all have a choice: we can improve on our strengths or we can improve on our weaknesses. To me, I’d rather bump up from 8 to 9, rather than struggle to get a 4 to a 5. Maybe it’s just the way I think. But what I do know for sure is that no one is great at everything.

We have to choose where we put our focus. So take what you’re good at, and become GREAT at it. If you don’t know what you’re good at, just think about what your friends ask your advice about. Or ask a close friend, or someone else who is honest and who really gets you.

6. Delegate Your “Opportunities for Growth” to Someone Else

I’m crummy at math. I hate accounting. But helping women build their self worth? That’s my strong suit. That’s what I love to do! So that’s where I place my focus and concentration. I have an accountant, a bookkeeper, and the most amazing office manager you could ever meet. They do the paper; I help the people. It works.

7. Manage Your Fear

We all get scared. The difference between women who make it and women who don’t is how comfortable they are, living side by side, with their own fear. Usually we fear failing. Everyone fails sometimes! That’s how we learn what NOT to do next time!

I really think that the only way to really fail is when you don’t try at all, or quit when things get tough. So, learn to manage your fear. Walk next to it and hold its hand. Recognize it for what it truly is. Fear is just doubt with a mask on. We all have it. Just don’t let it discourage you.

8. Understand How Your Brain Works.

Your brain is a search engine, and it’s going to answer any question you ask it. There is a reason why your brain triggers bad feelings. Pay attention the next time you feel discouraged and, looking back, you might notice these three things:

Bad feelings are actually caused by lousy thoughts. The lousy thought was an answer to a lousy question. Your brain created the lousy question.

So when you ask yourself, “What is WRONG with me?”, your brain, operating like a search engine, will scan your mind until it has an answer. Then your brain will answer the lousy question with something like, “Because you’re stupid,” “Because you’re totally unrealistic,” or, “Because you’re unlovable.” You forced a negative answer with a negative question. But when you replace lousy questions in your mind with better questions, you’ll get quality answers, creating a feeling of hope and confidence. Usually, what you think decides what you feel.

I hope I’ve inspired you to BELIEVE in yourself! There’s no good reason why great things can’t be in store for you in the future. So set the table for love, for success, for the future you want. And you’ll be surprised by how many wins you’ll get!