I still get scared at the top of my career

Instant panic. I woke up suddenly and immediately thought we are not ready! We are NOT ready! I knew there were still so many things to be done. Even if we finished them all, there was no way they were all going to work out correctly.

I exchanged emails with Jenna conveying my utter terror. She agreed, which offered no comfort. We weren’t ready.

Knowing that she felt the same, I sent an email asking if we should put it off another week or two. Then we’d be ready. Yeah, two weeks sounded a lot better.

But, she disagreed declaring, "We can’t put it off. We have to do this now!" Although I didn’t want to, I begrudgingly gave in and got to work.

Many would say I am at the pinnacle of my career. I am blessed to be able to consult with professional sports teams, businesses, and the US military. I’ve gotten to be on research teams who have changed the way we look at injury reduction in military and sport. But in spite of this apparent success from an outsider's perspective, I was still scared….

Jenna and I were about to launch a course for the Professional Rebellion. Although we had been working on it for months, I still didn't feel ready. I was actually kind of shocked that I was nervous (beyond nervous really).

So how did I get past it? I reframed it. We were no longer launching something that needed to be perfect. Instead it became a test run. An opportunity to make sure everything worked. I decided to live by an axiom I heard once:

An idea that is written 80% and published for others to read will impact infinitely more people than something that is close to perfect but never published.

That got me through.

I had to see the bigger picture. We weren’t trying to launch the perfect course. We were trying to change lives. Our mission was not have beautiful marketing or a flawless website. Since day one, all I’ve wanted to do is help people live their ideal career. I want other PTs to feel the way I do when I think about my career.  So, perfection didn’t matter… getting the information out there did.

Thanks for letting me share this post. I am really writing it for my boys. So they understand that in sports and life, it is okay to be scared and then still go do it anyway; especially if the fear is fear of failure.

Fear of failure and failure itself is the sign that we are doing it right. I want them to know that when they face challenges in their life they should take the jump, even though they're not ready.

I know that this is a post I’ll refer back to and possibly share with others again in the future. You don’t have to be perfect, but you have to do what scares you. In addition to sharing, post below something that you need to do that scares you.

P.S. If you missed the 3-day Challenge, you can find it here.