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This week I received an unusually high number of calls from clients who, for the lack of a better word, are nervous. They are nervous about the market. They are nervous about the economy. They are nervous about their budgets. They are nervous about the companies they are working for. They are nervous about their own jobs within the companies they are working for, and the list goes on and on. Ask me if I’m nervous: After all, I’m an entrepreneur whose livelihood is tied to all of these factors. The answer is a resounding, “No!” It wouldn’t be a BlArticle® if I didn’t tell you why, so let’s go a bit further with this.
To begin with, I’ve never been a fan of the word “nervous.” It’s not that I haven’t been apprehensive from time to time, but I just don’t like the word. I hear the word “nervous”, and I think of someone sitting in a corner chewing their nails, hoping for a solution they seem to have no control over. As an athlete, I never wanted to play a game when I was in a nervous state of mind. As a coach, I never wanted to coach a team that was nervous. As a salesman, I never wanted to meet with a client while I was feeling nervous. As a speaker, I never want to take the stage nervous. Even Webster’s Dictionary doesn’t seem fond of the word, defining it as: “easily excited or irritated: jumpy.”
How in the world can being nervous really contribute to your success?
Years ago, I decided to get rid of the word. I removed it from my vocabulary, and if there were a way to create a junk word list in my Microsoft Word program, that word would be the first in it. Anyone who knows me will tell you that they just don’t hear that word come out of my mouth. I replaced it with the word, “anxious.” Webster’s seems much more comfortable with this word; “Earnestly desirous; eager.”
That may sound like semantics to you, but to me, it goes deeper than that. I’ve never known anyone who performs better when they are nervous. When my kids used to tell me they were nervous about a particular situation, I used to tell them: “If I thought being nervous about it would improve my chances of success, by even 1%, I would be the most spectacular, competitive, nervous person you ever saw!”
Now, as for being anxious, that I can relate to. You can channel that anxiousness to energy, focus, and truly believe it can contribute to your success. It’s amazing sometimes what a simple word change can do. Rather than push the thought of nervousness away, you can embrace the idea of being focused. Author Dan Millman once said:
“You don’t have to control your thoughts. You just have to stop letting them control you.”
Strangely enough, I actually want to be a bit anxious before I walk into a high-pressure situation. I know I won’t have to be concerned about being flat! Ironically, if I truly felt nothing while under pressure… I suppose that would make me nervous!
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