Anything is possible (Part 1)

“You’re capable of more than you know.”

Glenda the Good Witch of the South, Oz the Great and Powerful

Darren and I watched Oz The Great and Powerful recently and there was one phrase that kept coming to me and being repeated over and over. Anything is possible.

It’s amazing how many blocks we put in our own way in life. How many limiting beliefs we have. How many times we can tell ourselves that we can’t do something.

I had a tonne of things standing in my way this time last year as I was starting my own business. I thought to myself, ‘I can’t start my own business, I’m not clever enough, I don’t know enough, I’m not experienced enough, I don’t have the capital, I don’t know the country, I’m on a working holiday visa.’ The list of limiting beliefs was endless.

However, one thing was true. I wanted to stay in Australia. In fact, two things were true. I wanted to stay in Australia and I wanted to run my own business. I didn’t want to work in the Corporate World any more. I wanted to be in control of my own destiny. I wanted to be at the helm of my own ship.

And so how did I overcome all of these limiting beliefs? Slowly but surely, just as Oz does in the film. When he first arrives in Oz and everyone tells him that he is the great and mighty Wizard, he doesn’t believe them. He knows himself to be just a simple illusionist. But, as the film continues, and the belief of the people living in Oz grows, he starts to believe that perhaps he can help them after all.

Brilliantly, he decides to help them, not based on who they think he is, but who he really is. Someone who can turn the impossible into the possible. Someone who can turn ideas, into reality.

And that is exactly what I did when I set up my business. I took an idea and made it a reality. And any limiting beliefs, any uncertainty, any nervousness, hesitation or anxiety that got in my way. I just looked each and every obstacle straight down the lens and told myself that it didn’t exist, it wasn’t real and that it wasn’t serving me or helping me to achieve my goal.

My goal was to make the seemingly impossible, possible. To set up my own business, sponsor myself and be one of the first people in Australia to do this. And just as Oz overcame his fears to become the Wizard of Oz, I overcame my fears to become the Good Witch of Thought Cloud. Well, maybe not a Good Witch, but a Thought Leader nonetheless.

And so, my questions to you today are these. What is it in your life that you’d like to achieve, but are being held back by your own limiting beliefs? What seemingly impossible thing would you like to make possible? What would you need to let go of to achieve this? Who would you need to become?

I’d love to read your thoughts on today’s post in the comments below. And I know that by sharing your thoughts and ideas, you might help or inspire other people who are perhaps thinking and feeling exactly the same way. Plus, sharing is caring.

Sending you lots of love, hugs and light,

Kat x x x

Inspiration for this post

The film – Oz The Great and Powerful

Today’s photo – a picture of me at the Blue Mountains a couple of weekends ago with Darren and my little sister Nicola and her husband John who were visiting from New Zealand. We enjoyed torrential rain all day on the Saturday, but we crossed our fingers and hoped to manifest clear weather for the Sunday, which we did. We all got some great photos, including a magical photo of the Three Sisters with a rainbow at the foot of it.

Read Part Two of Anything is Possible tomorrow to see the photo and learn about how Darren and I have started to cultivate our friendships with our visiting cockatoos.

Believe in yourself

“All you need is confidence in yourself. There is no living thing that is not afraid when it faces danger. The true courage is in facing danger when you are afraid, and that kind of courage you have in plenty.”

– L. Frank Baum, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz –

Today I woke up and needed to give myself a pep talk (something that happens from time to time). After all, we all need a good pep talk every now and then.

I have set myself a few goals recently that I am currently working towards, and every now and then I get a little worried or scared that I might not achieve them. The same thing happened a lot last year when I was pursuing my goal of gaining sponsorship status for my company, so I could sponsor myself and get a visa to stay in Australia. It’s a long (and very awesome story) and you can read the whole thing on my About Me page.

The fact is, sometimes when we want to achieve something more than ever, and its something that is really important to us and we would absolutely love to achieve it, we allow the little voice in our head to plant the seed of doubt. And this voice, if we allow it, can sometimes get louder and louder the more attention we give to it. This is not cool, because if we’re not careful, we actually end up sabotaging the thing that we’re trying to achieve, because we’ve convinced ourselves that we can’t actually achieve it, despite that we set the goal in the first place. So it can become one big paradox.

I watched a really great TED talk this morning called ‘The Skill of Self Confidence’ on this exact subject by Dr Ivan Joseph. He talks about how important it is to believe in yourself, especially when perhaps no one else will. And he also gives some helpful hints and tips of things you can do to build your self-confidence.

My favourite piece of advice that he gives is to write a self-confidence letter to yourself – I LOVE this idea, and I’m going to write one today. He says that when you’re feeling particularly good about something you have done, write a letter congratulating yourself on all of the awesome things you have achieved in your life, and pull it out whenever you need a pick me up. I used to do this with my Linked In profile when I was feeling particularly rubbish at work, or if someone had criticised me. I would read all of the beautiful recommendations that people have made about me throughout my career and focus my energies on all of the good things about myself.

Another thing that I have in my life, that gets me through the tough times is a positive motto or mantra. My motto is ‘Onwards and Upwards‘. Whenever things get a little too tough, I do whatever I need to do to improve or fix the situation I’m in, get over it as quickly as possible and move onwards and upwards. I even have a Pinterest board that I go to for inspiration if I’m having a particularly tricky day.

We came up with an awesome motto for the festival that I’m working on at the moment yesterday, which is ‘Keep bouncing‘. We were talking about how if you’re at a gig moshing, or on a trampoline or bouncy castle it’s impossible not to feel happy or have fun when you’re bouncing. And more importantly, you can’t continue to have fun, without keeping bouncing. It’s the same approach to life that Tigger has too.

And I’ll leave you with a beautiful quote from J.M.Barrie’s Peter Pan which brings this post back to the importance of believing in yourself:

“The moment you doubt whether you can fly, you cease for ever to be able to do it.” 

Have a fantastically positive day, brimming with self belief and confidence. x x x

Inspiration for this post

Dr Ivan Joseph’s TED talk – The Skill of Self Confidence

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz – L. Frank Baum

Tigger 

Peter Pan – J.M.Barrie