Courage: Your pathway to self-actualization and personal development.

Many people, at some point in life, feel like they are holding in a pattern and not making any real progress toward their long-term personal or career goals. Your relationships or job may feel like a dead end; you may even feel trapped on the road to nowhere, or maybe on a treadmill where you can’t see where you are headed.

You may likely have a good family and friend circle that supports you, a roof over your head, and a good job that pays the bills and has an impressive title; yet you feel dissatisfied and unable to do anything to shake off that feeling.

More often than not, this dissatisfaction is the result of trying to live up to certain standards and expectations –that we set on ourselves based on how others perceive us and expect us to do –instead of being true to ourselves and following the process of becoming everything that we are capable of becoming.

The Hollerith Experiment

The Hollerith experiment conducted in 1890, that was originally meant to measure the success of his tabulating machine that automated the process of counting census, accidentally proved the co-relation between dissatisfaction, under-achievement, and self-actualization.

Herman Hollerith divide the trainees into two groups

He told one group (group A) that a well-trained operator can turn approximately 550 punch cards a day and told the other group (group B) that he doesn’t have the estimate yet; and that they just have to punch as many cards as they could.

When the results came in after two weeks, he saw that group A had turned punches close to 550 to 700 per day while group B had an average of around 2100 punches a day.

Clearly, group A was conditioned and worked based on what they were told the best possible outcome could be. Whereas group B worked independently, purely drawing on their own capacities without any set limitations or expectations.

So, just like this experiment, if you truly want to live up to your full potential, make progress, and feel content with your life, career, or achievements, you have to become self-actualized, i.e., true to yourself.

How to free yourself from other’s expectations and be your true self?

Most of us spend our lives like the group A in the Hollerith experiment, based on other’s expectations for us. We fear disappointing others –be it our parents, partners, friends, or colleagues. As a result, we unknowingly act only to satisfy their beliefs and expectations on us for what we can or cannot achieve, what we should or should not do, and how well we can do something, and end up limiting ourselves. This is also the reason why so many people have seemingly perfect lives and still feel frustrated, dissatisfied, and unfulfilled.

Now, how do you free yourself of this fear of disappointing others and move towards the path of self-actualization?

You have to do the one thing that every hero does in every movie!

Be courageous – act (be yourself and do your thing) despite the fear of letting others down and not being accepted.

Here are some everyday acts of courage you can practice to become self-actualized:

• Introspect and accept yourself fully and whole-heartedly. At the same time, accept others for who they are.
• Accept that everyone has different life experiences, personal beliefs and environment, and thus different points of view towards life.
• Do what makes you happy, not what you think will impress others.
• Know that you can’t please everyone and not everyone will agree with your choices.
• Learn to say no and practice sharing your opinions when you disagree with someone.
• Take off the mask of perfection and accept your flaws.
• Take responsibility and accountability of your choices. If you don’t like a choice you made in the past, make a realistic action plan on what you can do to change it.
• Learn to be okay with failure. Replace the word ‘failing’ with ‘learning’.
• Follow your own path and do the things you fear –be it as simple as saying no to a dinner plan you don’t want to go to or standing up for a decision you made.

Most importantly, always remember the words of Sir Winston Churchill, “Fear is a reaction. Courage is a decision,” and decide to be authentic to yourself every day.