Ruth Soukup - Do It Scared Finding the Courage to Face Your Fears, Overcome Adversity, and Create a Life You Love

contents

This book would not have been possible without the help and guidance of the following people. Thank you for your impact on my life, my work, and this book.

Chuck, my rock, my love, and my best friend. Thank you for supporting me and cheering me on, no matter what. Thank you for encouraging me when I feel like quitting, challenging me when I need to be pushed, making me laugh, and always reminding me to take my own advice and do it scared.

Maggie and Annie, my sweet girls. I love you so much, and Im so proud of both of you. Thank you for always giving me something to write about. You keep me humble and remind me of what matters most.

My RSO familyLaura, Heather, Jayson, Natalie, Jessica, Kelly, Kristene, Emma, Melissa, Amanda, Maggie, LaTrisha, Ashley, and Danny. Thank you for making it a joy to come to work every day. Thank you for being all in, supporting my crazy ideas, telling me no when necessary, and forcing me to sit down and WRITE (even when I didnt want to!). I love our constructive conflict, our L10s, and our daily huddles, and I love the way you always push me to be better. Seriously, how lucky am I that I get to work with each and every one of you each day?

Friends I adore, both old and new, who provide much-needed accountability, encouragement, and tough loveAlysha, Edie, Bonnie, Heather, Laura, Natalie, Kate, Susie, Gry, Laura, Janna, Shelly, Bill and Wendy, Lisa, Melissa, RachelIm so grateful for each and every one of you!

Grant and your whole team at Launch Thought Productions, for helping us sift through all the research and then helping us conceptualize and build the Fear Assessment. This amazing tool would not exist without your team!

Lori, for both your patience and your pushiness. I am so thankful to have been able to work with you again on another book!

Charles and Meg, for always keeping our books in order, Bond for always helping us crush our goals, and Full Cycle Marketing for being such a big part of this Do It Scared journey.

All the people who helped bring this book to life and get it out there to the worldthe whole Zondervan team, especially Carolyn, Alicia, and Dirk; Andrew Wolgemuth, my literary agent; and Ashley Bernardi, the best publicist ever!

And last but definitely not leastall the blog readers, podcast listeners, planner customers, and EBA students who make our incredible community what it is. Your passion, courage, and compassion inspire me every single day! I love watching you do it scared, and then encouraging others to do the same. Together we can change the world!

Perfectionism is not as much the desire for excellence as it is the fear of failure couched in procrastination.

Dan Miller, 48 Days to the Work You Love

Alice has always liked things to be just so.

Shes incredibly particular about the way she dresses, how she does her hair, and the way she decorates her home. Its important to her that these things be right, even if she cant always explain what right is. In fact, shell sometimes spend hours tweaking the smallest thingschanging her top or shoes or accessories, or moving a vase or photo frame around the roomjust trying to get them right.

Preferring to get things right is a theme that comes up a lot for Alice. The truth is that the thought of making a mistake terrifies her, sometimes so much that she is afraid to begin at all. To compensate for this fear, she often starts working on a project early in order to give herself as much time as possible, because she knows shell probably be tweaking right up until the last minute, wanting to make sure everything is just the way it should be.

As a student, she often tried to get ahead on her schoolwork, sometimes starting before the teacher had even handed out the assignment. Even so, she never turned in an assignment until the very last minute, sometimes even pulling all-nighters just to check and double-check everything one more time and to tweak it until it was perfect. But when there was an assignment she really dreaded, shed put it off almost indefinitely.

These days, Alice works as a graphic designer for a fast-growing, start-up coffee company. She likes the work (and the coffee), but she also finds it very stressful. Because the company is growing so quickly, things are constantly changing, and it feels like almost every project shes asked to work on is needed ASAP, which doesnt give Alice any time to get ahead. Her boss has no idea that she often stays up half the night endlessly tweaking her designs in order to get them done on time. The lack of sleep, the constant change, and the intense pressure she puts on herself to make sure everything is always perfect are starting to wear Alice down.

Change makes Alice extremely uncomfortable. She prefers to stick to a routine and to the things she knows really well. Her friends and her husband sometimes tease her about being rigid, but Alice prefers to think of herself as being consistent. Even so, that need for consistency can hold her back sometimes. She feels anxious about saying yes to anything that is too far outside of her comfort zone, even when theres a part of her that would like to break free. When she was asked recently by her church to participate in a mission trip to Kenya, she was too afraid to commit. It just feels so far away, she said, and there are so many unknowns!

Because her job is so stressful, Alice has thought a lot about branching out on her own and becoming a freelance graphic designer. The thought of being able to work from home and set her own hours is appealing, but she is also terrified of making a mistake or misstep when it comes to starting her own business. In fact, she is so afraid of failing that she just cant seem to take that step. Sometimes she feels paralyzed.

Alice has high expectations of herself and of everyone around her. When she and her husband fight, he accuses her of being a perfectionist. Alice doesnt understand why thats such a bad thing. Whats wrong with wanting things to be perfect? In her mind, its better to not do something at all than to do it and have it not be right.

Alice is a Procrastinator.

THE PROCRASTINATOR ARCHETYPE

Also known as the Perfectionist, the Procrastinator archetype struggles most with the fear of making a mistake, which often manifests itself as a fear of commitment, or a fear of getting started. Because she is terrified of making a wrong move, the Procrastinator looks forand often findsany number of perfectly legitimate reasons not to begin or not to try at all.

Ironically, on the surface, the Procrastinator often exhibits behavior that seems to be the opposite of procrastination, such as planning things far in advance or trying to work ahead. Its important to realize that for the Procrastinator, procrastination doesnt necessarily occur in the traditional sense of simply putting everything off until the last minute. Instead, the Procrastinator wants to avoid making any mistakes and will therefore try to give herself as much time as possible for a task.

As a general rule, when push comes to shove, the Procrastinator is afraid to act and can often find herself paralyzed by indecision, especially when decisive action must be taken quickly. The Procrastinator prefers to spend an inordinate amount of time researching, planning, or getting organized. While this high level of preparation can be advantageous, it can also stymie progress when the research, planning, and organization become a substitute for taking action.

At their core, Procrastinators are terrified of messing up or making a huge mistake, especially one that cannot be reversed, and this intense fear can prevent them from moving forward toward their goals and dreams. They often require an outside influence or deadline to compel them to act; left to their own devices, they will sometimes put things off indefinitely.