By Darren Hardy of ‘Success’
magazine
YOU look down. Below you is a thin tightrope wire, a mere 2
inches thick.
One thousand three hundred and sixty-two feet below that is
the unforgiving pavement of the streets of New York City.
 |
| Philippe Petit during his epic tightrope walk |
You see them; busy people rushing off to work, school, home
wherever they are heading - as you take your first step across the sky.
At first, no one notices you.
“Maybe that’s for the better,” you think. “It’d only add to
the pressure.”
But you thought too soon.
A man stops. He looks up and sees you, a speck against the
clouds. Your heart rate rises.
This is getting real.
As a crowd gathers, the breeze picks up. It’s colder up
here, frigid actually. And more unpredictable.
Instead of blowing from one direction, the gusts come
from all around - zig-zagging across your face, tugging at the long bar you
carry for balance.
You sway back and forth 110 storeys above the ground,
suspended only by the two inches of rope under your feet. “Breathe,” you think.
“In. Out. In. Out.”
By now, thousands of people stand below you.
Watching. Stunned, admiring, or waiting… like those who
watch a NASCAR race.
Their hearts pound in unison with each step you take - moving
across your precarious perch in the sky.
Every step you take brings you an inch closer to your
destination, to your dream, but with every step and movement you also face
death.
This walk will make you. Or it will end you. And the choice
is yours; you get to decide your fate. It all depends on how you handle the
stress of the situation.
The onlookers may be cheering or screaming for you to turn
around, but you hear none of it. On top of one of the loudest cities in the
world and you hear nothing.
Everything is silent as you take the walk of your life.
Twelve people have walked on the moon, but only one man has
ever, or will ever, walk in the immense void between the famous World Trade
center towers of New York City.
Philippe Petit was that man.
If you were to rank the most stressful events in your life,
it is likely that none of them would come even close to the death-defying walk
of Petit.
Petit was never daunted by the challenge of walking between
the twin towers in New York City. In fact, the height and magnitude of the
towers and the challenge they presented inspired him.
If walking the wire between the towers weren’t stressful
enough, the addition of the feat being a secret, and then being pursued by the
New York Police as his death-defying walk began certainly added to the stress.
But for Petit, the stress wasn’t a negative thing. It wasn’t
an obstacle to overcome; it wasn’t a hindrance; it wasn’t something that could
or would prevent him from accomplishing his goal.
In fact, stress was actually on his team. Stress helped
build his strength; it kept his composure, heighten his senses and kept him
focused on the task at hand.
Stress can be defined as the brain’s response to any
demand - any one of them. Of the many, many demands placed on us daily, stress
is a possible response.
This means almost anything can trigger a stress response.
The question is, does that mean it is bad?
Think about it, when people make demands of you, are they
always bad?
They might be unexpected, they might be expected - the brain
can respond with stress in either case.
The demands might be daunting, or they might be thrilling.
No matter what the demand, it is going to evoke a
reaction. How you react, how you handle the demand is
the key.
Petit took the demand of walking the high wire above the
streets of New York and transformed it into an awe inspiring thing.
As a result of the stress he felt, he accomplished something
no one had ever done before or would ever do again.
That is the power of stress. The power to bring you and your
performance to new heights.
Maybe not literally like for Petit, but at least
figuratively.
Increasingly, researchers are exploring the positive side of
stress.
Some believe short-term boosts of it can strengthen the
immune system and protect against some diseases of aging like Alzheimer’s by
keeping the brain cells working at peak capacity.
People who experience moderate levels of stress before
surgery have a better recovery than those with high or low levels, another
study showed.
Recently, a study suggested that stress could help prevent
breast cancer because it suppresses the production of estrogen.
Next week I will show you how you too can thrive on what you
once considered stress (*See links below
for ‘Conquer Your Stress', Parts 1 & 2).
We are going to reframe your thinking to harness stress as a
tool you can utilize to grow and learn so that you are a top tier performer in
every aspect of your life...
...even if you don’t plan to tightrope walk between
buildings thousands of feet above the streets of New York City.
P.S. I share more inspiring stories, as well as success
insights and tips in my free daily mentoring program. Check it out here: www.DarrenDaily.com
Article source: http://tiny.cc/32tr2x
* Conquer Your Stress,
Part 1: http://tiny.cc/b9tr2x
* Conquer Your Stress,
Part 2: http://tiny.cc/2cur2x
No comments:
Post a Comment