Participation

Pedro would shy away from participating in meetings or activities of the organisation he belonged to. He would rationalize away his discomfort, saying that, ‘Participating in everything is unnecessary. I am committed to be sincere and hard working. Why should I do this silly stuff?’

So often, we hear similar justifications from those who need to operate outside their comfort zones. The refrain is: ‘connections do not matter; what matters is the value of our work,’ or ‘People who network are grovelling or full of themselves, and who wants to be that.’ These statements camouflage the actuality of the situation: that we are afraid of networking or public speaking and that we refuse to accept the real reasons of our non-participation.

Surely, if we our chosen situation was free of all anxiety and stress, it would be exhilarating to do that very thing. Fear is the hurdle that limits our belief and behaviour. It is pertinent to note that acceptance of the fear that engulfs, helps us move onto the next step in the process, which is to use our power of justification for instead of against participation.

We must stop tricking ourselves. So instead of finding reasons why something is not worth performing, we must find reasons why it is worth performing.  We must step out of the comfort cage and work on activating this tough, but important paradigm shift that will provide opportunities to grow and show exciting ways to move forward.

After all, acceptance of our comfort cage, moving to finding positive motives for involvement and eventually proactively participating will unite to impact the possibilities of success to our true potential. For the limits in our mind will limit everything we do, never mind our capability!

Recognize fear; find reasons to pick proactive participation

‘unite to impact’ the escape from comfort cage limitation!

- Pravin K. Sabnis

Goa, India.