When I first engaged in a sales career, I thought it would be challenging and fun. Never did I realize that I would be facing my inner most fears and deep hidden thoughts. Interacting with hundreds of people on a weekly basis can be somewhat invigorating, and certainly keeps your mind preoccupied. But when it is all said and done at the end of the evening, pondering my day sometimes was quite an event.
I realized things about myself that I had buried deep in my soul. I was terrified by some of the outside world. It was difficult for me to speak to a certain social class of people, yet I was comforted by another. Remembering back to my childhood, I had a few caretakers with heavy Latin and French accents and I always remembered being loved and well taken care of by them. Meeting those accents in my adult world, I was completely comforted with their presence and it was so easy for me to interact with. In fact, I built my confidence doing sales pitches to these people.
It took me years to realize why. On the flip side, I was terrified of the rest of the world. Did feeling so safe with a certain group mean that the rest of the world is bad and unpredictable from a tiny child's perspective? Did I grow up listening to my inner child and keep that belief system until facing that fear provoking thought process while doing outside sales? I forced myself to desensitize the fear. Outside sales actually gave me the avenue to face some of my innermost ideas, thoughts, and fears and change the ones I wanted to. It gave me a new found confidence that I can face the world with a different set of mature eyes and realize that I am in control. I could not have done this had I not pushed myself to knock on the next door.
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