We all have experienced a time when we hear a voice telling us our goals are impossible, or even worse, unimportant. These thoughts might come from doom scrolling online then turn into an inner voice that we need to silence rather than amplify. Bose Akadiri, author of the Joy Amplifier, shares three ways that you can let joy lead, quiet your inner critique, and amplify your inner cheerleader…
Overthinking and too many opinions
Opinions are coming at you from left, right, above, below, and all around. You begin to ruminate on a decision, as there are as many options to choose from as there are menu items at The Cheesecake Factory. Your pro-con list has an equal number of pros and cons. How do you know you’re making the right decision, the best decision? You seek clarity by asking peers for advice, googling until you’re on the sixth page of search results, and getting wrapped up in the Reddit conversations on the topic. This overcomplication goes on for days, sometimes weeks, or even months, then you crash without making a clear decision. The complications and answer-seeking lead to sheer mental and physical exhaustion. You’re depleted, yet you still don’t have your answer.
Pause.
What if this cycle of endless rumination isn’t about fear or your inability to come to a conclusion? Perhaps it’s about too many external inputs shaping your plan to progress. External expectations can drive you to a level of perfectionism that simply isn’t realistic, amplifying anxiety around your choices.
The pressure to constantly “get it right” combined with endless options overstimulates the mind. The real problem isn’t that people don’t know what they want. It’s that the competing external viewpoints become louder than their own inner voice. The advertisements on every website telling you they have the perfect solution. Leading a team of hundreds where you want everyone’s voice to count, and you end up with hundreds (or thousands) of opinions in a survey. How can you make aligned decisions when every decision seems mission-critical?
Fear vs joy
Fear is to be expected. Focus your attention on joy rather than fear to enable action.
In a comparative study on emotions, researchers at the School of Medicine, University of California, San Francisco, found that “Positive emotions predicted increases in both resilience and life satisfaction.” Furthermore, they assert that “Positive emotions also mediated the relation between baseline and final resilience.”
Fear creates undue pressure to make the “right” decision, perform a certain way, and more. Joy makes you more resilient in the face of pressure. In fact, research has found that “Happiness and resilience are closely interconnected, with multiple studies indicating that higher levels of happiness contribute to greater resilience and vice versa.
Choosing joy is rarely about having perfect certainty. It’s about making decisions that may go against every-thing you’ve always known. It’s about honoring a quiet truth inside you, even when that truth breaks from the expected script. Fear is simply an indicator that you’ve come upon a fork in the road where you get to make a decision. Remember that joy is a choice just as much as fear. Give yourself grace as it takes time, practice, and a renewed commitment to your joy to continue implementing this mindset shift.
Imposter syndrome and self-talk rewrite
I want you to write down everything you’re proud of yourself for accomplishing. Then, write down what your boss and/or teammates have recognized you for. Also, consider any awards you’ve received and what they were recognizing you for. After you start this list, it’s important to keep it updated. Set aside time each week to write down your wins in your Accomplishments Journal.
Career transitions are hard but not impossible. That’s why imposter syndrome can start to come into play. When that happens, I want you to take out your Accomplishments Journal and read your wins out loud. It’s important to hear yourself read them because it becomes more real than when you read it silently. Your wins are not silent…they’re loud and proud so join them in being proud of YOU!
Plan from joy, not from pressure
Starting with your own personal joy factors empowers you to dream outside of the box! When worldly expectations and negative self-talk influence you, it is hard to think outside the box of what you “should” be doing, but when you take time to look deep within yourself, you won’t even remember there’s a box to consider staying within.
About Bose Akadiri, the author of the Joy Amplifier
Known as The Joy Amplifier™, Bose Akadiri is a motivational keynote speaker, corporate trainer, author, and CEO of Goal and Grind LLC where she partners with high-achieving professionals and forward-thinking organizations to leverage joy as a strategic advantage for setting goals, building strong teams and creating meaningful results. She has led a distinguished career in Corporate Social Responsibility at Boeing, Salesforce, and JPMorgan Chase. She is the author of the new book, The Stay Joyful Method: Using Joy as a Tool to Rise, Lead, and Redefine Success. Visit goalandgrind.com to learn more.
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