PepTalk
Everybody needs a cheerleader...somebody in their corner hyping them up to perform their best. That's me. Everybody also needs a Coach...somebody in their corner giving them tips to tap into all of their potential so that they can make the most of their life! That's also me! This podcast is where those two elements converge and I speak to you about ways to work hard, pray harder, believe better, and live life to the fullest in every single way on every single day! It's time to level up, elevate, and slay the day! Have you had your pep talk yet?
PepTalk
#68: Confronting Neophobia: Tackling the Fear of Starting Something New
Have you ever been held back by the fear of trying something new? Join me, as I confront neophobia head-on in this powerful episode of Pep Talk. Through heartfelt conversations with my wife and therapist, I tackle the paralyzing anxiety that uncertainty and past failures can cause. By exploring insights from Plato and Rumi, we discuss how even the smallest steps can lead to great beginnings. Whether you’re contemplating writing a book or launching a business, this episode aims to empower you to take that crucial first step.
Ready to transform your life in just six months? We'll explore the importance of leaping into action, recognizing your passions, and dedicating yourself fully to new ventures. Hear motivational stories and practical advice on how to overcome stagnancy, build confidence, and discover unexpected opportunities. Plus, I encourage you to share your progress with us—your journey might just inspire others on the show! So tune in, get inspired, and as always, keep it love, keep it light, and keep it peppy.
Send us a fan mail and let's continue the conversation!
And if this episode resonates, leave a 5 STAR review!
Email: Thepeppodcast@gmail.com
Insta: @_Jbspeaks
Twitter: peptalkpodcast
"Soaring Confidence"- get your copy of the hit eBook NOW!
"Slaying the Lion"- Grab your copy of my FIRST published book with 5-star reviews across the board!
When's the last time you had a pep talk? Pep talk, pep talk. Yo. When's the last time you had a pep talk? Has it been a minute? That's okay, you're in the right place. I've got you.
Speaker 1:Welcome to Pep Talk, where today we're talking about neophobia. Now let's get it. Yo, what's good everybody, welcome to episode 68 of Pep Talk. I'm your host, coach J, a life coach in DFW, and it is my pleasure and my privilege to be here to start off another week or whenever you listen during the week. The mission of this podcast is to cheer you on and to coach you up. I believe that everybody needs a cheerleader to encourage you and everybody needs a coach to challenge you, and that's what we try to do, bringing pep to your week, and I hope that you have been enjoying rocking and rolling with us. If you're new to the podcast, welcome. You are officially deputized into the pep squad. That is our community of people who believe in delivering encouragement, motivation and inspiration. No matter where we are, no matter who we're with. We want to leave a situation and a person in a better situation than we found them, if at all possible, because we believe that a rising tide lifts all ships, and as much as as possible. We want to be that rising tide.
Speaker 1:Now let's jump into today's topic Neophobia, the fear of starting something new. How many of y'all show of hands? How many of you all struggle when it comes to starting something new? I'm going to pause, I'm going to wait, even though I can't even see your hands out there. How many of you struggle with starting something new? Maybe you have a book idea and maybe it's not completely lined out, but if you were to start it, you could probably come up with something amazing. But you sit at your computer and you just stare at the keys. Or, better yet, you do everything possible to avoid picking up a pen or a pencil. You do everything possible to avoid typing on your computer. As a matter of fact, when you think about wanting to type, you grab your phone and you scroll TikTok instead. Or how many of you have a song idea and you can just imagine the lyrics and the instrumentation of the music, but you never pick up your instrument to play. Or you have a killer I mean an absolute killer business idea, but you won't make yourself sit down and write the business plan or even put what you have in your head down on paper.
Speaker 1:I'm asking how many of you struggle with starting new things? Now, here's where this question comes from, because y'all know, y'all know, like I told you last episode, I am in this journey with you. Ok, I'm walking along beside you, I'm trying to provide coaching for you, I'm trying to provide encouragement, but please believe, a lot of the topics that I speak with you all about I deal with the same things. I don't have all the answers. I'm trying to figure things out, just like you are, but I realized that over the course of my life I have been a starter. I'll start things Up until recently, I've noticed that the idea of starting some things, it really unnerves me, and I was talking to my wife about something that I really know that we probably need to start and I said, you know, this scares me enough that I would be willing to live with the regret of not doing it.
Speaker 1:Probably not my best moment, but it was an honest moment because I realized that I no longer am a good starter. A book idea I really don't want to start that, even though I know that I should. Song idea I probably should pick up my guitar and try to play something, write some lyrics down, but I don't Even journaling y'all Even journaling this whole idea of starting something new, I've noticed that I feel some type of way about it, this whole idea of stepping into the unknown, and it's not in every situation, but I've noticed that the things that really mean the most to me, I feel all kinds of I don't even know if it's anxiety, worry, it's a mix of them. However, I have trouble starting or forcing myself to start, even when I know that I have something good to start with. This makes me think about one of my favorite quotes by Plato, which simply says it's attributed to Plato. It says the beginning is the most important part of the work, it's the starting. And then I think about another quote by Rumi If all you can do is crawl, then start crawling. And there are so many quotes about starting and about new beginnings out there and yet so many of us again, because I'm in that same avenue of thought with so many of you the idea of starting something.
Speaker 1:It's triggering on so many levels and, as I have done some introspection on myself, had some discussions with my wife, had some discussions here recently with my therapist. My wife had some discussions here recently with my therapist, I can narrow down and I'm sure one of these things is going to hit you but I can narrow down why we struggle with starting new things, and I'm going to outline these things for you, okay. So we struggle to start new things. Number one because we have uncertainty about the outcome. Like we can't physically put our hands on the thing and say this is how this is going to work from beginning to end. Maybe because at some point in the past we had an idea about something and we wanted to control it from beginning to end, and it didn't work out that way, and so it's caused us to be gun shy, because when you step out into something new, you're stepping into unfamiliar territory. I don't care if your business idea is the same thing as somebody else's business idea. For you it's going to be a completely different thing, and I think it is that lack of assurance that the blueprint is going to work in the exact same way for you that it works for somebody else. It doesn't work that way. You can never be sure if it's going to work or not. The only thing that you have to be sure of is that you're going to stick to it, and when you're uncertain about what the outcome is. Sometimes that uncertainty is big enough to cause you just to not do it in the first place.
Speaker 1:Another reason fear of failure. Y'all there is a natural fear of not succeeding. Some people call it failing at a new endeavor. This fear can be absolutely paralyzing. I felt it myself because we end up worrying about the implications of not meeting expectations or we worry too much about the mistakes that we may make in the process. Another reason is stepping out of our comfort zones, because it involves us leaving what is familiar. It involves us leaving the safety of the boat and stepping out onto the water. We are creatures of habit, we are creatures of familiarity and then nine times out of 10, I would say 90% of us will choose what is familiar to us, what is comfortable to us, rather than the uncertainty of discomfort.
Speaker 1:Another reason might be expectations and pressure. There might be some external or internal pressure to perform well and meet expectations, and that pressure, those expectations, might come from internally, from you, or you may feel it from outside sources. Maybe you want to live up to your parents' expectations, if you want to make your parents proud or a mentor proud or somebody who's really poured into your life. That pressure, that weight of unfulfilled expectations is a real thing. I'm completely honest with you. I've felt it before in my life. I've talked about how I've had a lot of. There were a lot of expectations for me growing up. Some people thought that I was the golden child and to this day, there are moments in my life where I feel like I'm not measuring up right. I can trick myself into feeling like I'm not living up to the expectations of my parents because of how my life looks right now.
Speaker 1:There's self-doubt. We doubt our own skills and abilities and we don't believe that what we have within us is enough for what we need to do. And it's this lack of confidence that contributes significantly to the fear that we feel you see how these things go together yeah, significantly, to the fear that we feel you see how these things go together yeah, okay. There's also social and peer pressure, or perceived risks. We don't want people to judge us when we mess up and notice I said when, okay. And then you know, some new endeavors might involve risks that seem daunting. They might be financial risks, emotional risks with a new relationship, or personal risks like betting on yourself that one might perceive as overwhelming. So any one of those things, any combination of those things, can be the reason why we suffer from neophobia.
Speaker 1:And listen, before I go any further. If you find yourself in that place, if you are struggling with starting something new, understand, I get it. As I've said several times over the course of this episode already, I'm right there with you in so many ways, in so many ways, in so many ways, in so many ways. But I also, so I also think about the fact that and I mentioned this a couple of episodes ago, uh, that I saw this in a tiktok video that so many people will die with the pocket full of some days, like we say, say, someday I'm going to do this, someday I'm going to do that, and that someday involves doing something new, and we continue putting it off and gosh, I don't want to die with some days in my pocket, and you shouldn't want to die with some days in your pocket, because the best friend of someday is. I wish I would have. At some point, you're going to wish that you would have done the thing that you should be starting to do now. At some point, I'm going to wish that I would have started today on the things that I know that I should be doing so.
Speaker 1:Why don't we take the someday and turn it into today? Why it's time to quit putting things off? We only have so many heartbeats, we only have so many breaths, we only have so many minutes and seconds and hours. We only have so many days and, depending on where you are in your life, you'd never know if you're on the upswing or the downswing. So what are we waiting on? Why do we believe? Ah, procrastination is the sin of believing that God owes you more time. Procrastination is the sin of believing that God owes you more time.
Speaker 1:Time is not at our behest, as much as we want it to be, as much as we want it to be, and allowing the feelings of anxiousness and fear to hinder us Y'all. There are many of us walking around with bulging pockets filled with some days, but I believe first we need to disarm. We need to disarm all of these things that come along with something new. Right, and I think the first part about disarming it is understanding that the fear associated with trying something new, risking something, doing something that innovating, being a visionary, just doing it differently, it's normal. Can we normalize it, y'all? Can we normalize the fear and discomfort that comes along with trying something new. Can we normalize it? And while we're normalizing that, can we also normalize not knowing what we're doing but doing it anyway?
Speaker 1:I mean seriously that somebody out there is sitting on a million dollar idea, a multimillion dollar idea, but the fear and the lack of certainty and the not knowing is keeping you from doing it, because you think that everybody else does not experience that same fear, that everybody else doesn't experience that same, uh, that same, you know, butterfly, lack of confidence. No, people feel it. They may never tell you, but I promise if you could see on the inside of people when they're on the verge of doing something that they've never done before, we all feel the same thing before. We all feel the same thing. It's normal. You're not weird, you're not an alien, you're not strange, you are human and this is a part of your learning and your growth and your development.
Speaker 1:If we were meant to be here on this earth and in this life and to never grow, to be here on this earth and in this life and to never grow, then we would be okay with the mundane, we would be okay with the ordinary, and I'm not okay with the mundane and the ordinary. The ordinary is boring, the mundane is boring, boring. My prayers to God are that I would go on adventures through life with him. My prayer for you is that you would live life of adventure, daring to go where no one has gone before. Come on Trekkies To boldly go where no one has gone before. I believe that that is your destiny, I believe that is my destiny, I believe that is our purpose and I think, I think, I think that when we can stop comparing our experience to other people's experience and understand that our lives are unique books, volumes of stories, volumes of experiences that are being written every day, then that should give us a different perspective on our lives, because there are so many people, myself included, that the pages of our lives are filled with someday I will, someday I want to, one day I'm going to, one day I will.
Speaker 1:And there are pages upon pages upon pages of our lives that are ordinary and mundane and blase, and that's accomplishing nothing, when there is so much more for us to do. If we would just turn the page from someday and turn that someday into today, now, why not now? Why not grow? Why not go through the fear? Why not be okay with crawling until you can walk, understanding that the process of something new, starting something new, is gradual and, yes, there will be mistakes and some days it's going to suck, and some days you're not going to feel great about what you're doing, and some days you're going to pray God, I don't know what I'm doing. Please help me. Some days he'll speak back, some days you'll have to wait on the voice, but still you have to choose a path and walk it. Jay, you've got to choose a path and walk it out.
Speaker 1:What would happen if that thing that you started, that you've always wanted to start that new thing? What would happen if you dedicated six months of your life to it, to the ups, to the downs, to the celebrations, to the defeats, to the feeling on top of the world, to feeling as low as you could possibly go? What would happen if you started that new thing and wrote a new page into your book, added a new experience to your life and you dedicated yourself to seeing that through for six months? What if you embraced the feelings, acknowledged them and used them as motivation and fuel to keep you going? What if you developed the discipline and the habits that are necessary to sustain you for six months of building that new thing, of learning that new skill, of Come on somebody. Who am I talking to right now? Am I talking to you, do you hear me out there?
Speaker 1:Because I think that if you do, if you are dedicated to the path, the new path, then you will find a rhythm in it and the progress of walking the path will lead to a richness in your life that you never would have thought possible. See, it's not necessarily about the new thing becoming an amazing, big great, getting rich thing. The beautiful thing about the new thing is what it creates new and fresh and rich in you. Even if it doesn't make your pockets fatter, it makes your life fatter. Even if it doesn't lead to generational wealth, it leads to a generational infusion of boldness and courage. So you can't give up on the new thing and your someday needs to become.
Speaker 1:Today. Your brain is craving something new. Your brain is craving something new. Your soul is craving something new. The stagnancy of life is slowly draining every ounce of your life force.
Speaker 1:But you were created to be adaptable. You were created with room to grow. You were created to problem solve. You were created to remain relevant. You were created to build connections and as you're doing all of these things, you're building confidence and there are health benefits that come with learning and doing new things and you discover fulfillment and you discover doors that have always been opened to you.
Speaker 1:But you had to take the new pathway. Come on, we always pray God open a new door, but when he shows us a pathway to take, we say nah, nah, nah. So we never see the door that has been opened for years, some of us for decades. So how do we start something new? How do we do the new thing? Well, there are a lot of different ways to do it.
Speaker 1:I think if I were just going to be direct with you, I would say just do it before you give yourself a chance to think about it. Just do it. Can I give you an honest moment? Okay, so I initially had a block when it came to starting season three. That's why it took so long for this season to come back. I had a block when I thought about starting this new season. There was just something that I could not get over the hump with. And what I actually did. I was sitting upstairs in my podcasting space and you know what I did I put my headphones on, I attached my mic and before my brain could say, bro, what are you doing? I was already off to the races. I just jumped out and did it.
Speaker 1:And for some of us, for some of us, you're going to have to just jump out and do it before your brain can say what are you doing. You're going to have to jump out of that plane or go bungee jumping or get on that roller coaster. You're going to have to shock your system because for some of you, that fear of starting something new is so deeply ingrained it's going to take something deep, it's going to take something dramatic and system shaking in order for you to get over those challenges, to burst through those obstacles and to start that new thing. So if that's you, that's your advice, that's how you do the new thing Start, just start, just boldly, just jump into it, just jump into it. Figure it out as you go along. But maybe you're not that person. Okay, I get it. Okay, maybe you can start with some idea generation. Where are your passions? What problems are you trying to solve? What things interest you? And we're not thinking about making money. We're thinking about enhancing our lives. We're thinking about writing a new story on a new page, maybe a new volume of our story. So generate some ideas, okay, and then see what comes out in that.
Speaker 1:I'm sure, though, most of you out there listening don't even have to generate the ideas. You know what that thing is. It's always with you, it keeps nagging you, it keeps knocking on your brain. It keeps knocking on your brain. It keeps knocking on your heart. People keep telling you how good you are at this. You know you're good at it. You know you can build something out of it.
Speaker 1:I just believe, right now, that that new thing. You don't need to generate ideas. You don't even need to write, make a list of something. You know what that thing is. Yep, you've done all of the research and all of the planning ideas. You don't even need to write, make a list of something. You know what that thing is. Yep, you've done all of the research and all of the planning. You know what the goals look like. You know what. I'm not even going. You know what. Scratch all of that. You just need to do it, and if you are a careful person, yeah, you have to count the cost for something that you want to do. You have to think about the pluses and the minuses, but again, but again, but again, but again.
Speaker 1:I just believe. I believe this strongly in my heart that you just need to do it before your brain has a chance to stop you, before those inner voices have a chance to stop you. You need to take action. And you take action, understanding that you're going to have to be adaptable and flexible in the midst of it. Right, you're going to have to seek knowledge and learn. In the midst of it, you're going to have to stay persistent. In the midst of it, you're going to have to evaluate and adjust. In the midst of it. You're going to have to celebrate milestones. In the midst of it. You're going to have to lick your wounds. In the midst of it. You're going to have to readjust in the midst of it. But you've got to take action now and seek support from the people who roll with you. If you don't have people who roll with you, you just roll with yourself and as you're rolling with yourself, the people who are attracted to that energy are going to come and find you. But you've got to start and you've got to commit to the starting and you've got to commit to the continuing. Come on, I'm speaking to somebody out there. You have to commit to the continuation. Yeah, you've got to stay there with the disappointment. You've got to stay there with the feelings of defeat and just get back up and keep going, before those voices of defeat can hold you down and feed you the lies that have stopped you so many times before. Come on, I'm talking to somebody out there who needs to start today. Listen, embrace the process, stay committed to the process and remain passionate and prayerful about your endeavor, and you will see a shift in your life the likes of which you've never imagined, you would ever experience before. But you have to start. You have to start now.
Speaker 1:I had a vision the other day. I had a vision the other day. We were riding around. My wife and I were riding around and I saw a field, and it wasn't a new field, but it was an unworked field, and so my wife and I got out of our vehicle. When we walked over to the field, it had never been tilled, the soil was fertile, and so we just started working the field hurdle, and so we just started working the field. We started working the field, and as we worked the field, people started coming out of their homes and watching us work. But we kept working. And as we kept working, slowly people started joining us in our work and soon what was just the two of us became four, then it was eight, then it was 16. Then, all of a sudden, the field was full of people who were working alongside us. But those people would never have found us if we hadn't started. And that's my word to you the people will never find you. The dreams will never happen unless you start, unless you start. So if you've been looking for a sign, here's your sign You've got to start, you have to start. And with that I think we're going to close episode 68 of Pep Talk. I'm your host, coach J Life Coach in DFW. I am your biggest fan and I'm proud to be your coach.
Speaker 1:I hope that this edition of the podcast, I hope that it lights a fire in you. I hope it challenges you. I hope something in it makes you angry. I hope something in it makes you think. Maybe it brings tears to your eyes. I want to know. Something in it makes you think. Maybe it brings tears to your eyes. I want to know. I want to know.
Speaker 1:Hit me up at thepeppodcast at gmailcom and let me know what stands out to you about this episode.
Speaker 1:Is there something that you need more help with as far as starting something new? And if you're starting something new, tell us about it. I'll share it. Talk about it on next week's episode, because I want to give you a shout out, I want to encourage you, I want people to encourage you in this. We want to come alongside you and just continue to be a voice of encouragement, of motivation, of inspiration, encouragement and motivation of inspiration and of pep, because y'all know that's what we do here on pep talk, and so y'all know how we end it. Keep it love, keep it light and keep it peppy. And also don't forget, if you're enjoying what we're giving. Leave a five star rating wherever you listen to podcasts and let us know how you like it, and also help us out. Share this episode with somebody that you know needs to hear this message of hope and this message of challenge and starting something new. This has been episode 68 of the pep talk podcast. Y'all be blessed. I love you and I'll see you next week, peace.