Risk-taker…imaginative…venturesome…visionary…industrious…opportunistic—such are the expressions most people use to describe an entrepreneur. While these descriptions are usually accurate, many people fail to see entrepreneurs for what they really are: the embodiment of courage. Entrepreneurs know there is a direct correlation between success and their courageous leadership quotient.

Entrepreneurs represent the true portraits of courageous endeavor. Why? Rather than accept the status quo, they trust their own abilities, define their own career and step up to the challenge of creating the business of their dreams. They give themselves permission to go against the norm and make bold moves into uncharted waters. As a result, they reap intrinsic rewards from their own efforts and achieve the results that lead to long-term success. Below are the final four of twelve tips for entrepreneurs to apply everyday courage. How many did you access you apply and demonstrate? 

1. Live Convictions

One entrepreneur told me that applying his courage at work requires that he demonstrate daily an unconditional commitment to his beliefs, values and ideals. This is not an easy commitment to maintain, especially if you are stuck in invisibility—an obstacle to courage. Are you willing to showcase your talents, take a risk, face failure, overcome rejection and say “No” to conformity (a courage killer)? Conformity compresses talent. Savvy entrepreneurs know that there is a direct correlation between their courage quotient and success. Do you remember what it feels like to “fall on your sword?”

2. Confront abuse

Recognizing red flags that undermine success such as a client trying to discount your services or alter your course of action are a critical form of courageous action. To stand in your dignity means denial is not an option. Denial is a form of self-abuse that creates suffering such as sleepless nights. Reflect on a situation at work that causes tension (or worse) in your life. As you examine the situation, begin to notice your “default” courage settings. Then, take responsibility for your courage consciousness development and declare, “No more suffering.”

3. Overcome illness or loss

Do the challenges you face seem so daunting that you have allowed your unique talents and unlimited potential to wither away in neglect? Has self-neglect robbed you of the inner strength to act in your own best interests? If you answered “Yes” to either of these questions, you can begin to strengthen your spirit and overcome the obstacle of self-neglect that perpetuates physical illness or loss of identity. Throughout the day, how many masks do you wear that keep you neglecting your true Self? What mask are you wearing right now, such as depression, judgment, suffering or blame? Are you a “self-neglect profile” in non-courage?

Identifying the first small step to motivate yourself quells any anxiety. Focus on something immediate and easily reachable. This narrow focus helps you recognize that courage is an accumulation of small steps up the ladder, and this simple recognition helps you avoid standing on one leg in the dark. When was the last time you shed one false portrait?

4. Embrace faith

Wouldn’t it be nice if you knew a saint, such as St. Teresa of Avila? You could meet for a cup of java and talk about the aspects of working in as an enlightened entrepreneur. Saints started out as ordinary people; then, their purpose unfolded. The difference between the saints and most of us is that they listened and trusted the undertones of their hearts (their courage) while the rest of us allowed our ego-based scripts to keep us wavering in uncertainty. Uncertainty may seem unavoidable in our age of information overload, bombarded as we are with contradictory “facts” from every quarter making it harder and harder to distinguish truth from falsehood. But we all have a choice, and getting stuck in uncertainty is essentially choosing not to choose. By focusing our attention inward and following our hearts, we strengthen our faith in our true, courageous selves and step up, confident that we are following our own true paths.

Courageous Actions Equals Productivity

If everyday courage has eluded your spirit in the past, now is the time to step up and make your entrepreneurial vision a profile in courage—the one that reveals your heart and spirit.

• 1-4 Tips for Entrepreneurial Courage
• 5-8 Tips for Entrepreneurial Courage

If you believe someone would enjoy and benefit from this post, please share it. Just click on the + Share button and you will see lots of options for sharing it with friends including email, Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. Thanks!

Sandra Ford Walston is known as The Courage Expert and innovator of StuckThinking™. She is an organizational effectiveness consultant, speaker, internationally published author of bestseller COURAGE, trainer and courage coach. She is certified in the Enneagram and MBTI®. Please visit www.sandrawalston.com.

Sandra Ford Walston, The Courage Expert

Innovator, StuckThinking™

Follow me on Twitter and Facebook

© Sandra Walston

All Rights Reserved

Is your mental chatter preventing you from pursuing an opportunity?  Does your gut tell you one thing but you don't speak up?

Successful entrepreneurs have disciplined themselves to be courageous in all sorts of ways. Below you will find four tips to apply entrepreneurial courage. After you combine all twelve courage behaviors (click here to see the first four), you will be better suited to determine where you are weighted in courage actions and where you might be blind to a few other behavioral choices. For example, you may be proficient in expressing yourself (speaking up), but you demonstrate StuckThinking™ which shows up in fear-based actions. Fear is portrayed when you observe incessant mind chatter that over-analyzes all the worst case scenarios. This over-analysis keeps an entrepreneur from making decisive choices that result in lost opportunities. The outcome of this scenario is an attempt to control life’s situations. Control of the future is an illusion of the false self (ego).   Take time to self-assess and choose to strengthen a weakness in the following ways:  

1. Speak up

If you feel uncomfortable in a situation, believe your intuition and disclose why you believe the situation is not desirable. Exercise your courageous voice by challenging the status quo; make graceful waves when someone is putting you down or attempting to deter your passion. Swallowing your voice is the opposite of being the voice above the crowd. A courageous voice has learned how to embody “where courage meets grace.” Are you willing to have a “courageous conversation?”

2. Conquer fear

True fear is a survival signal that sounds only in the presence of danger; yet, our culture is stuck in the creation of dualities, such as courage or fear. In other words, you can’t have courage without fear. Not true! If you go to work and learn your biggest client has gone to your competitor do you allow anxiety to take over in the form of projections, such as “I am going to go under...” At this point, observe your mental chatter so you can monitor the fearful feelings. A courageous entrepreneur does not spend much time on regret. Fear blocks and paralyzes the heart; therefore, fear blocks courage. What percentage of your life, right now, is filled with regret?

3.  Reveal vulnerability

The storms that enter your work life offer opportunities for an honest assessment of your vulnerabilities. You discover that vulnerability comes in many forms, such as acknowledging your unhappiness, learning to move on through disastrous events and learning not to manipulate failures or mistakes. While this may seem like a sensible behavior pattern for an entrepreneur, the deeper truth is that revealing your vulnerability represents integrity and authenticates your True Self. This choice is the opposite of hiding your mistakes or a weakness that is accomplished through manipulation, which undermines integrity, breeds distrust and stifles “heart and spirit.” As poet e.e. cummings wrote, “It takes courage to grow up and turn out to be who you really are.”

4.  Reinvent self

One of the keys to productivity is to have the courage to do things differently. That is probably why many traditional organizations are constantly trying to reinvent their leadership models and redefine expectations. Strategizing means the ability to re-create daily, not just during the annual budget meeting at corporate headquarters. Entrepreneurs naturally tend to know this. Rarely generalists, they represent portraits of courageous endeavors. Why? Rather than accept the comfort of apathy, they trust their own abilities, define their careers and demonstrate the self-discipline necessary to create the business of their dreams. How often do you reinvent yourself?

• 1-4 Tips for Entrepreneurial Courage

If you believe someone would enjoy and benefit from this post, please share it. Just click on the + Share button and you will see lots of options for sharing it with friends including email, Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. Thanks!

Sandra Ford Walston is known as The Courage Expert and innovator of StuckThinking™. She is an organizational effectiveness consultant, speaker, internationally published author of bestseller COURAGE, trainer and courage coach. She is certified in the Enneagram and MBTI®. Please visit www.sandrawalston.com.

Sandra Ford Walston, The Courage Expert

Innovator, StuckThinking™

Follow me on Twitter and Facebook

© Sandra Walston

All Rights Reserved