Fear of Success? What's your Kashmir?

The title may confuse you in that is it psychological or political in nature. Rest assured I don't bring politics to this platform and am not a journalist. For some of you who are outside of the Indian subcontinent the title may not make any sense at all. Kashmir is a metaphor for something or some issue that isn't resolved or has been long standing. Now, read the title again, what I am asking you is what is it in your life that has been unresolved forever?

But then why fear of success? Fear of failure is world renowned and needs no introduction. Books have been written, melodies composed and movies filmed portraying the eternal fear of failure that diseases mankind. My way of dealing with life and business has always been counterintuitive.

For the purpose of this conversation, consider that you secretly fear success. Before you go on to rubbish the idea, lemme offer you empirical evidence from your life that will make it substantially clear to you that I did not write this piece under the influence of weed.

Imagine waking up one fine morning to realise that everything you always desired has been fulfilled and accomplished. You have climbed the epitome of success the peak in your business, career, finance, relationships, health and social stature.

• You have a thriving business with millions in income or revenue.
• You have a bank balance that could shame Warren Buffet.
• Your wife, kids and parents adore you.
• You are fit as a horse and fast as a hare.
• You are now more famous than Shahrukh Khan and Lionel Messi combined.
• You have arrived, even been on the Kapil Sharma show.

I don't know about you, but most human beings I know cannot handle this. You are incapable of standing a life devoid of pain, agony and trouble. Take a minute and look back before reading on.

If you survived this far, congratulations we are now about to figure why on earth would you not want to have all that your heart desires fulfilled?

The answer is, you and I as human beings are incapable of handling, vacuum or nothingness. Notice how a child gets bored on not having a game to play and throws tantrums? You are that kid grown up, refusing to let go the game.

When you hold on to dirt and filth forever, you are emotionally attached to it. Letting go is tough for us. That's how people fall in love with the stench of the gutter running close by and cannot imagine finding it gone.

This is perhaps the toughest confrontation of your life. It is extraordinarily painful, shameful and horrifying to accept the truth. As the famous lines from a movie go, "the truth shall set you free, but before it does, it'll piss you off!"

The path to freedom is this, look at all that is not working in your life. Be willing to stand in a place called, I in all honesty do not intend to accomplish this, coz then I'd have nothing left to brood over. Who and what would I blame if its all sorted? My life would be empty.

Standing stark naked in front of a mirror in a locked room where only you can see you, there is a glimpse of freedom and joy. With the newly found weightlessness you can now determine or set yourself up to achieving all that has been deceiving you forever.

And you know and I know once you set yourself to something with a clear strategy and actionable pathway, there is nothing impossible.

Begin to tell the truth about the liar and cheat you are. Be free. Create and accomplish and contribute on a magnitude and scale that is grand enough for you.

Corollary: The countless stories of riches to rags you read about in the newspapers everyday, from sports to movie stars to business tycoons; they couldn't handle the emptiness and vacuum that success brings.