Why I have NO FEAR

It was September 1997, and I was just entering my final year of school.

The following summer I would be taking my GCSE's and after that, well...

... I really didn't have any idea what I wanted to do at that point.

I was still the kid in class who always felt as though I lacked intelligence.

Every other kid seemed to get what the teacher was saying and I felt like they were speaking another language.

To make up for my lack of intellect, I would opt to be the class joker instead. Always trying to crack a joke or be slightly cocky to the teacher.

There was a lot of tension in school this particular morning as we were being given our English mock exam results taken a few weeks before the summer holidays.

English was perceived to be a particularly important subject as most of the jobs or further education so it was quite important for most people that they got a grade above a C.

This was one of the rare occasions that I felt that I had nailed the exam. Usually, I had zero confidence in my exam results.

"Stand up Jason Graystone" said Mr Shillito.

My English teacher is the ONLY person I remember by name from my entire school. It's like I subconsciously erased everyone else as soon as I left that place because I hated it so much at the time.

I stood up in the middle of the entire class.

He made three other kids stand up too.

At that point, I felt uneasy. The other three kids were troublemakers. They spent most of their school days outside the headmaster's office. Why was I standing up with them?

"Right Jason, how do you think you did?" Shillitoe said.

Mr Shillito (who we used to call "stupid finger"), was a tall stern looking guy but with a slightly cocky face that always looked as though he was about to laugh. So you never knew if he was being serious. I actually liked him most of the time but he really was really unpredictable.

This made it worse.

"How do you think you did??he asked me.

"I think I did alright on this one Sir" I replied.

"Hahaha, you can think again"?he said.

"You did terribly! If you think this is alright, you better buck your ideas up son!"

I started going red.

"If you don't buckle down and nail this now, your outlook will be bleak Jason" He looked disappointed as he threw me my paper with a big F across the front page.

As it hit the desk, I heard the sniggering of the other students laughing and even the usual troublemakers looked at me as if to say "Wow you are as stupid as us!"

I felt as though there were 30 laser beams on my back as I stood at the front of the class. I felt like time stood still.

Even I was short of a reply.

I sat down and sheepishly put my papers in my bag.

The bell rang and I decided that day that I needed to spend every other day in the school library learning so I could not be humiliated like that again.

At the time computers had just been introduced to the library with the entire Microsoft suite and it was there I fell in love with Excel.

I started to learn excel spreadsheets firstly to help me track my homework.

Then I would create tests for myself to complete on each subject using the spreadsheets.

The more I played with this program, I started to learn formulas, formatting, and I started to become fascinated with graphs, charts, projections, random distribution, averages, and so on.

By Christmas 1997, I was programming excel to track my homework, my grade projections, and help me with maths (which I was terrible at).

But best of all, I was able to create tools that would help me get connected with data.

Now I ended up failing all my GCSE's apart from Art which I got an A+ for but that is irrelevant to this story.

So what IS the point of this story and what the hell has it got to do with having no fear?

Well...

I often have conversations with people who tell me they want to become a master of their financial destiny and build a life that inspires them but they have fears.

100% of the time when I speak to these people, I find that the fear is an imagination of what might happen in the future based on something that happened in their past.

At that moment in time when Mr Shillitoe called me out in class, I felt like that was the worst thing that could possibly happen to me. I wanted the floor to swallow me up right there and then.

I was also bullied until my last day of school for reasons that span off of that event taking place.

I should have hated Mr Shillitoe!

I should have developed a fear of taking exams altogether.

I should have developed a fear of standing up in front of people.

I should have developed a fear of being shown up or called out.

But if he didn't call me out:

???I wouldn't have gone to the library.

?? I wouldn't have fallen in love with Excel.

???I may not have learned how to use Excel.

???I may not have become fascinated with data, trends, numbers, and problem-solving.

???I may not have become an engineer.

???I may not have been able to develop tools to help with my finances.

???I may not have been so clear about how to become free financially and not have to work again.

???I wouldn't have used my skill to create tools to help other people.

???I wouldn't have gone on to sell my services and tools to people and generate millions of pounds in revenue whilst serving thousands of people at a higher level.

???You wouldn't have been reading this and I wouldn't be where I am today.

THANK YOU Mr Shillito! ??

So when someone asks if I fear speaking on stage at the most respected investment stages in the world, I say "Of course not!" If I get shown up again, I know there will be hundreds of life-changing benefits to that event. So bring it on.

Fears are imaginations of what could happen in the future based on experiences that you initially perceived to be negative that you witnessed happen to you or someone else in the past.

Once you can get clear about what that event was, you can start to ask yourself what the positives were until the fear disappears.

You love the fear. You appreciate it. You know it helps.

If you are on a journey of building wealth, it can require a lot of courage.

You have to go against the grain.

Against the normal opinions and beliefs.

Fear can creep in when you are on this journey.

?? Fear of doing the opposite of what other people tell you to do.

???Fear of risk.

???Fear of investing without a return.

???Fear of shame.

???Fear of Guilt.

???Fear of looking silly.

???Fear of "I told you so!"

???Fear of losing friends.

???Fear of losing money.

???Fear of missing out.

???Fear of leaving money on the table.

Fear, fear, fear, fear, fear. ??

If you are to master your finances, you must conquer this elusive thing called fear. Otherwise, the chances of you becoming free are slim.

If you want me to help, I would love to. I'm running a FREE strategy session towards the end of this month where I will be covering many wealth-building strategies that are relevant to you and YOUR situation right now so you have a relevant plan to go away with and turn your life around.

Grab one of the last spaces?HERE?and we will work through this and much more together.

See you there.

JG

??

PS. I'm still crap at English but I'm just about to publish my first book.