Are You Limiting Your Success?

I was going through some of my writing folders and discovered this piece I had written some time back. As I was reading over it I thought it could be dusted off and shared.

Do we limit ourselves as to what we can achieve?  Is it fear, inhibition or something else?  Is it self-doubt, self-worth?  Are you afraid of success or afraid of what people will think of you once you become successful? Are we limited by the company we keep? Are we afraid of change?  After all, success is change.

What if your favorite author was afraid of success?  How many books would you have missed reading?  Where would your inspiration be?  Would you have the same inspiration to be a writer?

Would your friends stop speaking to you if you could afford to move to a nicer neighborhood?  Sadly, that’s often true.  Success is sometimes a mentality and some people just can’t grasp it.  Sometimes people would rather you stay at their level and a climb up the proverbial ladder of success would suddenly mean that you thought you were better than them, or they less than you.  People can be funny creatures.

It’s often said that if you want success you need to associate with successful people.  Where would that leave your friends?  Well, a friend that wants to hold you back and keep you on a certain level isn’t really a friend, or maybe it’s a needy friend, one who needs you to have the same low esteem and aspirations as he does.

Where do you find those successful people to hang with anyway?

Are you happy where you’re at or do you want more in life?  Do you want to be a success?  If so, what do you feel is holding you back from achieving your dreams?  Are you stuck with the same low paying jobs you had when you first decided to dub yourself as “writer”?  If so, have you thought why that is?  Are you afraid to go higher or try to achieve more?

Are you afraid to finish a story of novel, or afraid you won’t finish it?  Are you writing every day?  Do you set aside (even a few minutes) each day to write something completely spontaneous or creative?

Maybe you’re afraid you can’t write the perfect story.  Don’t worry; I think Stephen King and John Grisham still fear the same thing.  Maybe you think the rough draft has to be perfect.  I’ve recently discovered this about myself.  It’s not my root fear, but I’ve forgotten to just enjoy the process of writing.  I’ve forgotten that the rough draft is just that, a rough draft.  It doesn’t have to be perfect, that’s where edits and rewrites come in.  But it’s kept me from writing for a long time, so I’ve decided to set more time aside to just write.  I can write garbage if I want, the point is to write and break out of a shell.  I’m speaking of fiction.  It seems I’ve been writing non-fiction so long that the process of writing fiction has become alien to me.

This is where I stopped when I wrote this. I’ve gotten back into fiction and found the process is no longer as alien as I thought. Sometimes it’s good to just sit and pour yourself onto paper or a computer screen. You can learn about yourself and you can also discover if you’ve limited your success by allowing your fears to take over. Often, the process helps release those fears.

We want to hear from you.  Have you decided if you’re afraid, what it is you fear and how you’re overcoming the situation? Have you limited yourself to what you can achieve? Do you fear success? Be honest with yourself.

Written by Patti Stafford from Patti Stafford
Posted on November 11th, 2009 and filed under Writing
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