My Best Achievement 2014 and Why It Was Important to Me

In 2014 I had an excellent year, and I was fortunate to achieve some pretty amazing things:

• Inc Magazine Top 100 Great Leadership Speaker
• Inc Magazine Top 100 Leadership & Management Expert
• #1 Leadership Expert to Follow on Twitter Sept, Oct,  Nov & Dec
• #2 Top 15 Must Read Leadership Blogs
• #6 Most Socially Shared Leadership Blogs
• Became Visiting Professor
• Spoke on Leadership in US, UK, Germany, Tunisia, Morocco,
• Passed 1 millions visitors to my website
• Published my second Leadership Book
• Completed the writing of my third book
• Ran the Vancouver Marathon
• Ran the Athens Marathon over the original course

But of all the things that I achieved, the one that meant the most to me was when I passed my PADI Diving test and I learnt how to SCUBA Dive.

This was really important to me, because this really pushed me outside of my comfort zone, it is something that I have always had a fear of ever since I saw the movie JAWS 🙂

But I undertook this because my children Dan, Jessica and Lucy wanted to try and do it.

It wasn’t my choice, if I had had my way I would have avoided it. But they were very keen especially Dan, who wanted to take the PADI course, so I decided to bite the bullet and do it.

It taught me a lot about myself, more than any of the other achievements.

For the rest of my achievements, they were all something I wanted to do, things I was happy to achieve, but with the diving this was different.

Many of my fears were irrational, but to me they were very valid, and I really had to push myself to do it.

In the end I really enjoyed it, even though I was incredibly nervous at the start, and also tried to see if I could actually breath water which ended with me nearly drowning.

I was happy that I was able to conquer my fears and achieve something I thought I would never do, not because I couldn’t, but because I wouldn’t, because of fear.

It wasn’t about ability, it was about overcoming my fears, and doing something even though I was afraid.

This taught me that, even when we’re afraid we can still step out and be successful.  That we should look to challenge ourselves, take on those things that we fear, because when we are successful it gives us the confidence to try more and to do more, which is great.

Doing things we love or know we can achieve is good, but it’s a great feeling to achieve something that you were afraid to do.

So in 2015 I challenge you to take on something you fear and do it any way, it could be SCUBA diving, it could be Public Speaking, it could be anything, you know what you’re afraid of.

I am not suggesting you do anything life threatening, but we do need to push ourselves out of our comfort zones, and finding something you fear and doing it anyway.

It is so liberating, and will increase your self confidence, which will help you achieve even more with the things that you do like.

So go on, give something you fear a go!

Gordon

#Leadership Principles