Unfu*k Yourself: Get Out of Your Head and into Your Life (Unfu*k Yourself series)

by Gary John Bishop

people spend their lives waiting for the cavalry, all the while never realizing they are the cavalry. Your life is waiting on you to finally show up.

Assertive self-talk is when you stake a claim for this moment of time, right here and now. When you start to talk in terms of “I am . . .” or “I embrace . . .” or “I accept . . .” or “I assert . . . ,” all of which are powerful and commanding uses of language rather than the narrative of “I will . . .” or “I’m going to . . .”

If you’re not willing to take the actions to change your situation—in other words, if you’re willing to put up with your situation—then whether you like it or not, that is the life you have chosen.

“Fate leads the willing and drags along the reluctant.” - Seneca

“Life won’t stop for your pauses and procrastinations. It won’t stop for your confusion or fear. It will continue right along without you.”

“Where the willingness is great, the difficulties cannot be great.”

Is exercising thirty minutes a day really as impossible as your mind has built it up to be? Sure, you’re going to get a little sweaty and tired but you can throw on your favorite music to help the time go by faster. And, even though it might start out painfully, you’ll eventually get used to that and grow stronger.

You’ll realize that when you’re willing to do what it takes, nothing else matters. You won’t put off the things you’re truly willing to do. You won’t neglect the responsibilities you took on because you will feel the strong sense of willingness to do them.

Look at your track record; you’ve really got this! You’ll make it work, just like you always have. You had it then and you got it now.

Our obsession with certainty can be tragic and counterproductive for two reasons. First, uncertainty is where things happen. Uncertainty is your personal pathway to opportunity. It’s the environment in which you grow, experience new things, and produce new, unprecedented results. Uncertainty is where new happens.

Success is never certain. It never comes without risk. Even if you’re the smartest or the hardest working, there’s no guarantee of anything.

Missing the target isn’t the worst thing you can do. Not taking the shot is.

“Inaction breeds doubt and fear. Action breeds confidence and courage. If you want to conquer fear, do not sit home and think about it. Go out and get busy.” - Dale Carnegie

“Our biggest successes are born out of discomfort, uncertainty, and risk.”

But the Wright brothers didn’t accept that flight was impossible. They simply didn’t accept that thought—even though there was no historical evidence to prove that human flight was possible.

You’re not bashing your fist against a brick wall until it’s bloody and bruised. You’re using your hammer and chisel to slowly, methodically chip away piece by piece until eventually there’s a hole. And then the hole gets bigger. And bigger. And before you know it, you’re like Alice stepping through the looking glass to a whole new world. YOU ARE RELENTLESS

When you’re not sure if you’re following the right path, when you’ve been knocked down a few too many times, it’s completely fine to get discouraged, hell, even defeated. What’s not okay is to stop.

Because when you’re trekking through the jungle, you don’t know if you’re three days from civilization or thirty minutes. All you can do is walk. The only way out is forward.