How to Find Peace: Be Determined…Be Dauntless

I like to choose 1 word to be my focus and anchor each year. This year I wanted to learn how to find peace in my everyday life. The word I chose is "dauntless". I used to struggle a lot with of fear of rejection, perfectionism and self-doubt. I knew in 2013, it needed to end. You see, I turn 40 this year and I'm done with it.

You might be wondering why I didn’t just go with the word "fearless"? Well, it wasn't strong enough! Dauntless means - not to be intimidated, bold, resolutely fearless. Those sound like great words, but how do you go from fear to dauntless?

How to Find Peace – Step #1

The key lies in being really clear not just on what you want to achieve, but WHY! Setting goals is great, but unless you’ve got a strong reason behind them, fear can easily take over and make a mess of things. Most of the time the reason we fail to achieve goals we set is because, quite frankly they weren’t important enough for us to be willing to push through the fear associated with that change.

How to Find Peace – Step #2

You need to ask yourself – “How bad do I REALLY want to achieve this goal? Because reaching for any goal means stepping outside your comfort zone. The minute we do that, fear likes to try to creep in to lie to us about being “safe”. But if we play it safe, we’ll never move forward! For me, I knew this was the year I wanted to help more moms than I ever have before. I’m tired of seeing moms who are weary, just sleep walking through life, angry, tired and joyless. My initial goal was to help more moms, but once I got clear on why – because helping strengthen and bring joy to families is my life purpose, I was able to effectively deal with the fear of messing up and worrying about what others would think.

You see, once you’re clear on why something is important to you, you begin to clearly see fear for what it is! An attempt to derail you from the direction you want to take. Whether it’s a small goal or one that will allow you to redesign your life! Be clear. Fear is NOT some random thing. It has its own agenda and you have to be determined to recognize that.

How to Find Peace – Step #3

Then you must be dauntless by allowing yourself to be scared, inconvenienced or unsure without backing down. As you step forward in fear, pay close attention for fear's attempts to derail you. This will be little thoughts such as:

• That's dumb• What if.... I mess up, they think I'm stupid, they don't respond, I get rejected, etc.

And finally, watch for body sensations associated with fear. What are yours? For example mine are feeling shaky inside and if bad enough I'll shake on the outside, tightness of chest, and my hands going cold.

Your desire has the power to defeat the fear. But you have to understand clearly why that desire is important enough to even begin the battle. This is why the first step in the Vibrantly Live System is to Define What’s Truly Important and Why. It lays the foundation for all the work you will do moving forward into a life where you take better care of yourself and as a result are able to better care for all of those who are important to you.

So, how ‘bout you? Share your very best steps in the battle of how to find peace below.