21 Super Simple Ways To Reach Your Potential

Have you ever been told that you aren’t living up to your full potential?

Truth be told, most of people have yet to tap into their full potential!

In many ways, your “journey” in life is one where you are consistently expanding your comfort zone in order to tap into more and more of your potential. When you stop expanding your comfort zone, your journey halts, you become stuck; you get comfortable. You settle.

I’m not talking about the “hanging out in your sweats at home during the pandemic” kind of comfortable, I’m talking about the kind of comfortable that keeps you from learning, growing, and risking in ways that would enable you to reach more of your potential.

Getting Closer To Your Potential

In order to edge closer to your potential, you will have to do life differently. You will have to embrace change. Bottom line, you will have to get uncomfortable. That takes guts!

The good news – the more you step out and do what’s uncomfortable, the easier it gets. And believe it or not, it also increases your confidence.

What if you fail?  Well, failure is inevitable! Everyone fails. It’s how you respond to those failures that either moves you closer to your potential or further away.

What I’ve Learned…

I want to let you in on a little secret. Being a coach does not make you the exception! In order to realize my dreams and goals as a coach, entrepreneur, wife, mother, grandmother, etc, I’ve had to press through my feelings of discomfort in order to accomplish what I’m capable of. It’s been a huge learning and growing process. It’s forced me to STRETCH and do some challenging stuff – at least challenging for me!

I guarantee you that stepping into your full potential will require you to  face your fears, eliminate your limiting beliefs, change how you see yourself, and force you to cultivate new habits. I know it has for me!

Reaching More Of My Potential

Getting more specific, reaching more of my potential has meant overcoming my perceived lack of technical skills, getting over the way I look in videos, and being persistently creative about ways to connect with my ideal client. These all might seem silly to you, but I am certain you have your own personal hurdles that prevent you from maximizing your full potential!

Coaching is something I love; something I am passionate about. However, building a successful coaching practice in this day and age involves technology – a lot of technology, especially if you coach virtually like I do.

Growing up, the most complicated technology I encountered was a cassette recorder. I know it sounds archaic, but I actually taught my parents how to record messages to send to relatives that lived in another state. Technology has come a long, long way in the last 40+ years. I confess that for many years I relied on my children to help me out with all things tech related, but now they have all moved out, gotten married, forcing me to figure it out on my own!

Guess what? I’ve discovered that I am more capable than I realized! I’m still no tech genius, but I am perfectly capable of learning how to do what I need to do. Here’s the surprising thing: turns out, I actually enjoy the challenge of technology now! Of course, there’s always more to learn because technology changes rapidly, but when I wake up and discover I’ve been blessed with the “new” Facebook I no longer panic! I’ve got this!

You know what else I’ve discovered as I’ve pushed myself out of my comfort zone by creating videos and venturing out in bold ways to connect with my ideal client? What was once daunting to me is now something I sincerely enjoy! And it’s expanded my confidence too!

Full Potential Versus Underutilized Potential

So what’s the difference between people who live up to their full potential and those who consistently under utilize their potential? It’s their willingness to tackle what’s hard – the stuff that doesn’t come easy, overcome fear, and confidently pursue their goals. Sounds simple, but there are a million little ways to avoid doing what’s hard every day. There are all sorts of fears to confront. Plus there are a myriad of confidence stealers, not to mention the ways you sabotage yourself on the regular.

Perhaps this makes it clearer to you…

If you dare to edge closer to your full potential, here are some super simple ways to get started:

1. Set Goals & Take Action

Goals give you a target to shoot for!

2. Stop Making Excuses

Excuses are a way of cheating yourself out of what could be!

3. Live With Purpose

Purpose doesn’t have to be something huge like saving the world. Living with purpose is simply walking in who God created you to be. That might lead to something big or it might change you life in less dramatic ways.

4. Practice Self-Care

It’s crazy, but when you stop doing what’s energizing to you, how can you possibly have what it takes to live out of your full potential? Here are some practical ideas!

5. Stretch Yourself

Yes! Challenges are good. But not too many all at once. Don’t shy away from what’s not easy.

6. Boost Your Confidence

Just like a baby doesn’t learn to walk overnight (thank heavens!) it’s a process. They begin by pulling up onto furniture, then taking steps, falling, and trying again. Each little step builds their confidence. The worst thing you can do is to stop trying. Here are ways to start boosting your confidence.

7. Be Mindful

Pay attention to the thoughts that race through your head. Practice being present – resist the urge to multitask. It’s all about taking your thoughts captive!

…we take every thought captive and make it obey Christ. 2 Corinthians 10:5b (GNT)

8. Start Writing

Writing is one of the best tools to help you zero in on what you are really thinking! Just the process of writing forces you to think and that’s a good thing! You can’t take your thoughts captive if you don’t know what they are. It’s also an easy way to connect to your feelings.

9. Implement Routines

Successful people have routines! Here’s more on morning routines and evening routines!

10. Use Your Time Intentionally

You don’t want the day to run you, you want to run the day! Here’s some food for thought.

11. Be Committed to Excellence

If something is worth doing, it’s worth doing with excellence. That might mean you take on less, but your effort will take you much farther!

12. Increase Your Self-Awareness

It’s hard to know what needs to change if you don’t know yourself. Check this out.

13. Don’t Give Up

Keep on learning, growing, and trying! Some encouragement for you!

14. Face Your Fear Monster

He’s out to undermine you and keep you from stepping into your potential! Learn more.

15. Take Responsibility

Don’t blame – take charge of your life.

16. Prioritize

Be sure you are putting your energy into the right things! Are you paying attention to the right stuff?

17. Mingle With Good Examples

They say you are the sum of the people you spend the most time with. Are you rubbing shoulders with people you want to be like?

18. Engage in Empathy

It takes an empathetic person to figure out what others want! Helping others get what they want will ultimately get you what you want.

19. Face Your Fears

Here’s a little something to ponder when it comes to your fears.

20. Dwell on Who God Says You Are

Learn more about your identity in Christ.

21. Get Help!

Working with a coach is a powerful way to speed up the progress so that you can reach your potential! Take the first step.

Now, you might be panicking right now – perhaps wondering how you can tackle all 21 suggestions, even if they are simple. Don’t worry, just pick one to focus on. Work on it for a week, a month or a quarter. Once you’ve made progress in that area, move on to the next. Slow and steady wins – just don’t stop!

Sadly, whatever you focus on grows! Guess what happens when you focus on what you can’t do, don’t like to do, or don’t want to do? Thankfully, the flip is also true! When you focus on what you can do, what you like to do, what you get to do, then that’s what will grow.

Maximizing your full potential does not mean working 24/7 and striving like a crazy person! Instead it means working hard and taking the time to refuel by resting, investing in relationships, and practicing healthy self-care. Ironically, if you are wearing yourself out by perpetually working, you are probably NOT maximizing your potential. The same is true if you are barely working!

You were made to do great things! And you are capable of so much more! Bravely be who you were meant to be so you can reach your full potential!

No more settling, surviving, and just getting by!

How will you begin tapping into more of your potential?