The Fear Of Losing Success: What If It All Goes Away?

Do you wear some man thongs?

All the time.

I wear some hand thongs, he wears some man thongs, what? Hey it’s Marie Forleo and you are watching Marie TV, the place to be to create a business and life you love and this, wikiwiki whoo is Q&A Tuesday, that means I’m going to read a question and then I’m going to answer it. And today’s question comes from Phillip. And Phillip writes, hi Marie, I first discovered you last year when I cut the cord to my day job in Academia and I took the leap to doing my music business full time. I went from making no money from my art to charting number one on iTunes and making a comfortable six figures.

One of my biggest struggles is the what if anxieties about my business and the fear of not being able to stay at the top. I do not want to go back to a day job and I’m often paralyzed at the thought of what the heck would I do if I couldn’t do what I love? Sometimes I feel like my business is happening to me more than I’m happening to it. And to a large degree, I have no control over whether people buy my products. Would love for you to A this Q on the fears and pressures of staying successful, sincerely, Phillip.

Phillip, this is a really good question. You know why? Because, not that many people talk about it. And the other reason it’s a great question is because you can actually do something to take care of this. So here are three steps on helping you alleviate the fears and the pressures around staying successful.

Step number one is you got to pull the lap bar down. Now people have this mistaken notion that sometimes success is this uphill climb and then you plateau and then you just hang out for a while or you’re going to climb, climb, climb, and it never ends. Unfortunately, that’s just not reality. Success is a lot more like a roller coaster where there’s twists and turns and upside down loops and all kinds of things that make you want to hurl, and that is true for all of us.

So Philip, you need to sit your butt down, secure all your loose clothing and your jewelry and get ready for one heck of a ride because you’re on it whether you like it or not. And I got to tell you, the little pimply teenager at the control panel will not let you off. So don’t resist this fact, just pull your lap bar down and enjoy the ride.

Now, I’m not saying that you’re going to have to go back to your day job, but there may be a time when one record doesn’t sell quite as well as your last, or maybe you just hit a creative rut. But here’s the deal, there’s not one great artists or business person or human being that doesn’t have downs that go along with their ups. This is a natural part of life. It’s the yin and the yang, the back and the forth, the change of seasons. Nothing in this life is static, so don’t be afraid of that fact. You need to account for it, which brings me to step number two.

Step number two is don’t be MC Hammer. Now let me be clear, I do love some Hammer time, and fyi, Hammer pants are back. But you all know about hammer, right? I mean, accurate or not legend has it that once Hammer hit it big, he took all his money, he started buying fancy cars and big mansions, and then unfortunately, not only did he have to declare bankruptcy, but then the IRS came knocking at his door and they took away all his stuff and then they said, “You can’t touch this legally. Legally you can’t touch any of this. We’re going to take it away right now. That, we’re going to take that, I didn’t even … Never seen. What is that? Why? Did you spend a lot of money on that?”

Now thankfully, Hammer got himself back on track, but the lesson remains, you should always live below your means. One of the best ways to relieve stress and pressure around losing success is just to be really smart and mindful with your money. That means you should live simply, you should save and you should invest wisely. And one of the best things here is that a financial cushion actually gives you a creative cushion. This way you can keep taking risks with your music.

Step number three, deal with the worst now. Now this is one of my very favorite ways to deal with any fear. You’ve got to ask yourself, what’s the worst thing that could happen to you if you lost all of your success? Really think about that and then here’s the part that people miss, how exactly would you deal with it? I don’t want you to just say this out loud. I actually want you to write it down, really face the fear. What’s the worst thing that could happen and what would that mean to you if you lost all your music business success, emotionally and mentally and financially? Would you be out in the street? Would you lose your home? Would you have to be taken in by a friend?

Once you get all that down, then I want you to do this. Write down the exact actions you would take if that happened. In other words, deal with the worst case scenario now. What most of us find when we get to the very bottom of our fear is that actually we would be okay and when we create an action plan, we realize that even if everything went to hell in a hand basket, there are steps we could take to lift ourselves back up. So this is a very powerful exercise for both your conscious and your subconscious mind to start to release these fears so you can get back to enjoying your life and creating music, which brings us to our tweetable.

Let our advanced worrying become advanced thinking and planning. So Phillip, that was my A to your Q. I hope it helps. Now I would love to hear from you. Do you have a fear of losing the success that you’ve gained? If so, now is an awesome opportunity to do something about it. Let me know which of the three steps will help you the most. Do you need to pull the lap bar down? Do you need to get a better handle on your finances or do you need to deal with your worst case scenario?

As always, the best discussions happen after the episode over at marieforleo.com, so go there and leave a comment now. Did you like this video? If so, subscribe to our channel and I would be ever so grateful if you shared it with all of your friends. And if you want even more great resources to create a business in life that you love, plus some insights from me that I only get to talk about in email, come on over to marieforleo.com and sign up for email updates. Stay on your game and keep going for your dreams because the world needs that special gift that only you have.

Thank you so much for watching, and I’ll catch you next time on Marie TV. Does anybody else love Jack Bauer like I do? I want to make him chicken cutlet. His words and his actions were aligned. He has integrity. We’re getting there, we’re getting there. Finally, CC in the house.