Have you ever wondered how you can rely on yourself to find happiness and success? Then this article is for you!
Before I start, I just want to make something clear: by no means am I trying to say that you can’t be with loved ones to succeed. But sometimes you just progress faster when the only person you can count on is you.
What inspired me to write this post in the first place was a week when my boyfriend was away for work. It was the first time that I was on my own since we moved to a small town.
When we still lived in the city and he was away, the only thing I had to do by myself was watching Netflix at night. This time, however, I was working from home. And what’s even more important: I had a ton of stuff to do. Suddenly, I had to rely on myself to get everything done.
1. When you rely on yourself, you face your fears instead of running away
You should know that one of my biggest (and probably only) problem with moving to a small town was transportation. I am terrified of driving. I’m a horrible driver, too, and the thought of taking the car and going somewhere by myself would cause me major anxiety for years.
And I had successfully avoided it while we were living in a big city! With public transportation and all, we barely even needed a car.
Now back to the week I am talking about: I had a business meeting on the other side of town. And while I’m usually up for a long walk, one and a half hours one way doesn’t cut it even for me.
I knew I was going to have to drive there, and my anxiety about it was growing with every passing day. And then I suddenly had another meeting. And a third one. All far away from our side of town!
2. When you rely on yourself, you have to at least try
Let me get to the chase. If my boyfriend was there with me, I would have found an excuse not to get out of my comfort zone. I’d force him to drive me, or I’d tell him that he’s using the car anyway and take this as a reason not to go to the meetings.
It’s honestly the same as getting takeout with a friend and making them call to order. Or asking your parents to take care of your taxes because you don’t know how to do them.
Well, this time I was on my own. And there was a little voice in my head telling me that I had to at least try and take responsibility for my success.
The first time driving on my own was scary. But I got home safe, and so I took the car again. And again. And do you know what? I ended up loving it!
So here’s what I want to say with all of this: Sometimes you need to be on your own to unlock your full potential. When you’re with other people, it’s easy to rely on them. Or blame them. In any case, it’s far too easy to deny responsibility for reaching your own goals.
But when you’re suddenly on your own and there’s something that needs to be done, you have no choice but to rely on yourself. No matter how convinced you are that you can’t do it, you’re going to try anyway.
3. You already have what it takes
Oftentimes, we reject responsibility for our success because we believe that we’re not good enough. And that is simply not true.
Am I a bad driver? Sure. But only because I never practice. And the same goes for everything else in life. You simply can’t be good at something that you’ve never done before!
When you rely on yourself for success, you actually give yourself the chance to progress in life and learn new skills.
Are you still afraid that you won’t succeed? Don’t be.
When you want, you’re able to figure out anything.
If you liked this post, please don’t forget to share it with your friends!
Nice to learn about you and your life. Keeping posting these type of posts that are fully true about your life.
And reply me on email i will promote your post.
Thank you! 🙂
Yes! I agree with the fact that you have to rely on yourself and try again and again until you succeed!
There’s no better feeling than proving to yourself that you can actually do it!
That was a great article! Enjoyed reading it. Loved the the thing you mentioned about driving the car and get your things done on your own!
Thank you!
This is so familiar to me. In the past I was pointing fingers to everyone but me. My mentality only changed when I went on my first solo trip ever.. I don’t know what you think about this, but my opinion is that you need to suffer if you want to grow as a person. To do things that you don’t want to do.
Now you actually should set a goal, to keep doing things by yourself once in a while.
I totally agree! You can’t grow if you don’t get out of your comfort zone.
Similar to you, now that I am running our businesses from home, I have to make many more business-related decisions by myself. When I was working outside of the house, I could always afford to run everything by him every time. The pace was slower then. Now, every single day, I have decisions to make that impact our business and I know that checking in with him constantly will slow down the process (which might hamper our results). And I don’t know about you, but I can convince him that we made the right choice of letting me stay home and run the businesses with the more forward progress he sees. That means that it is MY responsibility to make progress every week (which means I need to get a bunch done without him). It has made me more confident and it has made him trust me more, which is why I know what you went through. Thanks for sharing your experience.
I had the same thing! When you work for a company, you always have a boss to validate your decisions. Not all I can do it consult people around me but the decision remains my own, so I can’t blame it on anyone else if it goes wrong. I sort of love it though, even if it’s harder. At least when something does work, I know that I was the one who did it!
great post! thanks for sharing !
I’m glad you liked it 🙂
I actually really needed to read this this morning! Awesome read!
I’m so happy to hear this!! Thank you. 🙂
I feel the same way as you! I love this post and I’ll be following you since I like your content! Its so important, at the end of the day the person pushing you out your comfort zone will be you.
So true, no one else can do it for you! Thanks. 🙂
This is so true! It takes so much to get out of the relying on someone else mentality.
It does! And I don’t know about you but I constantly fall back into it if I’m not careful… it really does take some effort to take things on by yourself.
This is so true. It’s amazing what we can accomplish when we find the courage to step into things unknown. Whether you take that step on your own, or someone pushes you into it, we often grow a lot from the experience.
Yes! It’s impossible to grow if you always stay in your comfort zone.
Hey Karina, it’s amazing what happens when you are forced to do something outside of your comfort zone. I’m glad you were able to get passed the anxiety and learn that you actually enjoyed something you feared you would not. I hope you are able to continue with this mindset you have put yourself in!
I hope so too, haha! But the truth is, once you see that you’re capable of doing something, you’ll be less frightened the next time – at least for me! So it’s easier to move forward.
I love this❤
Thank you! 🙂
I 100% do this! But since my girlfriend will be starting grad school soon & I’ll be working, I think we’ll both be leaving our comfort zone very soon.
It’s a good thing though! Leaving your comfort zone makes you grow as a person, even if it’s hard. So if you look at it this way, it can only turn out positive!
So true! I was exactly the same with driving and now, like you, I drive everywhere.
That’s great! It’s like you need to prove to yourself that you can do it once, and then it becomes much easier.
Beautiful article…..yes earlier we start relying on ourselves..better it is for us……. overcome out internal fears…
Thank you
So true – the earlier we realise that we don’t need others to do things for us, the more we actually dare to try.
Hi there. I really enjoy reading your posts and this one is especially interesting and inspiring. It is so true and perhaps something I haven’t thought of before but we do learn more and are able to do things when we are in fact alone. Because then the comfort zone is gone, its either we get it done or it doesnt happen.
I love how you phrased it! When we have no other choice and can’t stay inside our comfort zone, we suddenly thrive and accomplish things that we would never have done otherwise.