I have the audio book “The Chimp Paradox” by Steve Peters. The summary from four-minute books reads, “The Chimp Paradox uses a simple analogy to help you take control of your emotions and act in your own, best interest, whether it's in making decisions, communicating with others, or your health and happiness”. I found this book very motivating as Steve is leading the way empowering people to be their best. I’ve been compelled to listen to the book a few times but one section that hit me hard was how he described doing your best. It literally floored me especially as a person who worries more than the rest about what others may think.

Let’s take a presentation you're scheduled to perform for your wider business unit or a public speaking gig. You might be tempted into thinking thoughts like: I hope this goes well? I don’t want my boss to think bad of me? My hands usually sweat, I have to ensure they don’t, somehow! What if they don’t like it? The computer usually acts up when I try to present or I hope I don’t go blank, my voice usually goes low and trails off and I come across as not being confident… the list continues like a Canadian freight train of Whiskey to the US after prohibition. Does any of this sound familiar? Even if you don’t consciously beat yourself up with these negative emotions, there is usually a dark “thought cloud” hovering over you, your ego and spitting catastrophizing bolts of lightning you only see and feel.

However you can tell yourself and agree that you will:

1.     prepare to the best of your ability.

2.     do your best to create the presentation using the time you have.

3.     be positive in your ability and notice any negative self-talk and replace it with a more rationale thinking such as “this is new learning that needs practice so I can only do my best each time as I grow my skills and experience.”

You will know when your preparation is complete when you can answer “Yes” to the 3 actions above, but let’s not get too perfect here as we never really feel completely ready. We will always need to push ourselves into the final step of action. To help with this, and when it’s time to head into the presentation, say to yourself something along the lines, “I have prepared to the best of my ability with the time I had available and I will do my best today. That is all I can do and whatever happens I will deal with the consequences because I am a mature professional adult”. This will calm the mind and help to deliver your best work while also bringing awareness to how you might continue to grow and embrace any outcomes with a learning and growth mindset. All promoting you doing your best again, then again and again so your confidence grows as well as your life experience.

The picture below shows my hand written note on “Doing my Best'' that I have used to keep me sane when I fall into the trap of worrying what folks might think or screwing something up. Perhaps you could write your own note and recite it as you prepare and again when you need to perform a task that gives you a bit of the heebie-jeebies.

Doing my Best

“Plan, prepare, do my best, nothing else matters. I don’t care what people might think of me, that I need to please, that I have to be right, they are thinking in a similar way already, so I can get away with more if things don’t go right, I can cope because I am an adult, I can deal with the consequences. Things are never that bad, ever. If I give it my best shot at the time, with the time I have, that is all I can do.”