This is “Your Impact: The Podcast” Episode 8: Take advantage of fear”, and I’m April. Today I’m diving into Chin-Ning Chu's book “Thick Face, Black Heart: The warrior philosophy for conquering the challenges of business and life”. Chin-Ning Chu is an internationally renowned speaker and bestselling author of business psychology, and champion of universal truths about the nature of effort, success, detachment and “creating luck”. There are many key insights condensed into this book, so this title will appear a few times this season. But for today, we will focus on the concept of: being a coward. Chin Ning-Chu explains, “before we can succeed, we must clearly understand that success means change and the risk of failure.” When you are letting years pass chasing approval or fulfilling the expectations of others, or neglecting your dreams, or being nice for the sake of appearing virtuous - you are acting out of fear and as a coward. I was pretty gutsy as a kid - I didn’t care so much about others’ opinions, at least I don’t remember caring, but as I grew older I started to become more careful. When someone told me I looked like a marshmallow in a winter jacket, I refused to wear a winter jacket Mid-January in Canada for the next 10 years. Or that one time I got an answer wrong in class and heard snickering laughter around me, and because I feared feeling that embarrassment again, I became reluctant to speak up in class, and swore to my peers that I was just better at writing than I was at public speaking. Or more recently, when I left a safe and well-paid job to pursue a dream that failed, and I kicked and screamed and cried, and tried to blame others, or timing, or my stupidity for months - and the fear of failing again stunned me so much that I did almost nothing for what felt like i really long time. It was only until I went through a deep reflection to understand where my fears were coming from, as well as my self-destructive patterns, when I knew I had to stop allowing fear - and my emotions - to control my life. It is accepting life’s harsh lessons and learning from them, rather than to be destroyed by them. Understand yourself so that you will know what to do in any given situation. Fear, instead of filling us with agitation, is energy that can lead us to a state of exhilaration, or intense concentration, or love. So focus your attention on your goals and ignore the costs. One of the core ideas to being someone with a Thick Face, Black Heart, is to be able to put self-doubt aside and refuse to accept the limitations that others have tried to impose on you, and to hold strong your inner sense of worth. There is a power in detachment and dispassion that will enable you to face life’s challenges with calm and grace. When you succeed in detaching yourself from the misery of your experience, you will see with complete clarity, the real nature of your situation. Remember: extraordinary people don’t care what others think of them. And, the more fear you confront and conquer, the greater courage you will possess. You just listened to: Episode 8: Take advantage of fear”. I’ll be back with new episodes every Sunday so I’ll see you there with more thoughts on how to live better and find your impact. Be well.