One of the major obstacles we have to overcome is our selves. We simply get in the way of our own journey.

This style of obstruction comes mostly from our belief systems, what we believe to be true, even if it is completely wrong. For many of us, these beliefs, about what is fair, the way things work, or what we deserve or can expect, are in place by the time we reach our late teens. The problem is most of them are wrong, in some cases not just a little bit off the mark but up to 180 degrees away from reality.

Carrying around these beliefs is in effect a disability, as it restricts us in our ability to make an informed decision about the next best move forward.

Often our beliefs are passed on by those around us. These people may be seriously under qualified to give an opinion and they just continue their cycle of belief through into us. What they know and believe may once have been true; but could now be a generation out of date, and has long been passed by with the advance of discoveries in technology, science, medicine or finance, to name a few.

The dream we have, to achieve something specific in our lives, can be easily quashed by someone near to us who doesn’t believe it is possible and voices that opinion. A dream can be diverted or diluted by someone who wants to protect us from failure and so convinces us to take a safer option. The result in the end can be a journey much further away from our original goal, so far in fact that the end result is the ‘other person safe dream’, not ours.

Many wonderful singers, who as children may have taken the brave step to sing out loud only to be told, it wasn’t good enough, or to be laughed at for trying, quietly retreat away, never to sing again.

When people pass comment about us, they are telling us all about themselves. The person, who told the child they couldn’t sing, didn’t want to sing themselves. Or did want to sing, but didn’t have the courage. They passed on their beliefs and fears to the child. The result a disaster for both parties!

So the first step to success is being careful who you share your dreams with, make sure they are people who will support you on the journey, and that they will be able to put wind under your wings.

The next step is to ensure that if you need advice; to only get it from someone skilled in that area. Why would you take financial advice from someone poorer than you? Why would you take medical advice from a builder, or take real estate advice from a restaurateur.

So you can see how others can affect your journey, and that can be much easier to see because you will have someone ‘external’ to blame.

You need to remain totally focussed on the outcome of your goal or your dream and no matter what, no matter who tries to divert you, who tries to dilute it or who tries to contain it or whoever tries to quash it, you remain true to yourself and to your dream!

But what about yourself? The number one internal terrorist to achieving your dreams!

The last step is to deal with your internal conflict, and perhaps the greatest hurdle to overcome, is getting started then sticking to the plan. A test I like to use when I have to complete a task that I don’t really want to do, but needs to be completed to get me one more step closer to my end goal is the ‘Pleasure or Pain’ test.

It is simply this, no matter how bad the next task is, how much I fear it or how much it puts me out of my comfort zone, – will the end result be more pleasurable of more painful to me.

If it is going to be more pleasurable then I do it. If the end result is more painful I don’t. Everyone will have an opinion about why it can or can’t be done. You will be bombarded with facts and figure, opinions, strategies and ideas but….

Just remember this!

“If the dream is big enough – the facts don’t matter”