Did I tell you the one about the elephant?
In 2010 I went travelling around the incredibly beautiful south India for 3 months. Having met some friends out there for a couple of weeks over the New Year, we decided to go on a little adventure together off the beaten track.
It was only a matter of seconds before we were offered guided tours on the back of motorbikes and private rickshaws for 2 days’ hire…we decided to take a bus in the end and headed from Varkala up into the mountains towards a tiger sanctuary.
On a stop-over along the way, we could hear laughter behind the trees and saw lights. It sounded like some kind of performance and we headed closer to take a look. It was indeed a small, locally produced play with puppets, a stage and a small audience of families. Despite the language barrier, we could see everyone was having a lovely time. As we went even closer though, we stopped sharply, awe-stricken, at what until now had been camouflaged against the night’s sky.
The elephant was beautiful. Powerful…he could easily have squashed you with one stamp of a hoof. But he was also scared, agitated even. His eyes were wide, he was huffing and puffing, moving around quickly from one foot to the other. And no more than about 10 feet away.
Two of his legs were tethered to the tree he stood beside by nothing more than an old, frayed rope. This elephant could have broken free and stampeded at any moment. Seeing the group of us so close to the elephant and the accompanying look of alarm on our faces, his keeper came running over.
As he tried to reassure us the elephant was fine and wouldn’t hurt anyone, gesturing towards the frail ropes around its legs, someone pointed out that the elephant could easily break the ropes and charge. Even though the elephant clearly wanted to get away and easily could have, he didn’t. He simply stayed put.
The trainer replied, “We use the same size rope to tie them up since they are tiny. It’s strong enough to hold them at that age but as they grow up and get bigger, they believe the rope can still hold them so they do not try to break free.”
These animals could break their bonds at any time but because they believed they couldn't, they always stayed stuck right where they were. This ginormous creature had limited its present abilities by the limitations of its past. His true power remained uncovered and a mystery to him because he didn’t push hard enough or for long enough to break barriers.
Like the elephant, how many of us go through life holding onto a belief that we cannot do something, simply because we’ve been conditioned to believe that if we try, we’ll fail? How many of us refuse to attempt something new because of a limiting mindset?
I’ve been working on my online video coaching program where I coach 'authorpreneurs' through 5 modules covering WBR’s Book Creation Process?, previously only available to customers of our done-for-you services.
Now, authorpreneurs can do it themselves on their own time, in the comfort of their own home, with a tried, tested, world-class system enabling them to create and promote a world-class book. Something I’ve learned through working with hundreds of authors over the last 3 years is that mindset plays a HUGE factor in their success, just as it does in other aspects of business.
In fact, mindset is so important that I created a module around it in the course in order to start members off on the right footing. There are some interesting author archetypes that authors benefit from being aware of, all four of which are unpacked and explained in the first videos. Answer the questions below to start challenging your own mindset:
- Can you identify your own limiting beliefs or indeed, behaviours?
- What opportunities would be available to you if you felt the fear but did it anyway?
- What is one action you can take TODAY to make progress towards those opportunities?
If you're ready to wave goodbye to your own limiting beliefs and find out what it takes to publish and promote your book, contact us on [email protected] or 020 3752 7057 and a member of the team will schedule your FREE 45 minute Book Discovery Call.