Recently, I was perusing book titles on Amazon looking for more summer reading material. I came upon one entitled “Unstoppable Self Confidence”. A quick look at the summary and a few reviews, and it was in my cart.
I don’t often purchase self-published works, but the topic really caught my interest. Being self-published means you often have to tolerate a certain amount of typo’s, usage errors, etc. This book was no exception, but I was able to overlook the small errors and glean as much as I could out of the content. The author believes we all have what it takes to achieve our dreams and goals if we “unlearn” some of the things that have been holding us back!
The book is broken into 4 main sections
- How to Prime Your Mindset for Incredible Success
- How to Remove the bad Programming That’s Holding You Back
- Installing the Mindset of the 1%
- Living life on Your Terms
Many “self-help” books are filled with a lot of “cheerleading” that might get the reader pumped up in the moment, but offer little in the way of truly actionable ideas. This book is different. I have to admit, I was a little pumped up after reading it! And… there were some concrete ideas I could actually implement.
I have a sticky note on page 285 (it is a long book!). On that page, he lists out 24 of the rules that he lives by – rules we could all adopt if we wish. He fleshes out these rules throughout the book. I liked this list so much that I actually read them aloud to my wife, daughter, and her boyfriend at the dinner table at the house! We got into a pretty good discussion of what each one meant and how it applied in our lives. Great stuff!
Another concept he discussed, was the idea of win big / win small.
In the author’s view, any time you take on a challenge, there are really only two possible outcomes. You could really hit a home run and win big. But failing that, you should certainly learn something from the endeavor that will make you better in your next effort. To put it in shooting terms, if you enter a fun shoot, you might very well come away with a punch or two which would be a “big win”. But, even if you don’t punch on a given day, you should be able to learn where you are deficient on a technical or mental skill that you can work on for improvement for the next time – that would be a “small win”! So, no matter what, you are going to win that day – it’s just a matter of whether it is a big win, or a small win that prepares you to do even better the next time out. Think how much that can build your confidence (and how the jitters on that first stand might just be calmed a little) if you know that the outcome will be positive no matter how you perform on a given day. After all, it is long term progress that we are all looking to achieve in our hobby! A series of small wins very likely will result in a big win down the road! The real trick is not attaching yourself to any one specific outcome. Life is good whether you have a learning day or a podium finish!
So, next time out, try adopting the Big Win / Small Win mindset and see how that works for you!
If you are interested, here is the link to Andrew Leedham’s book: