As I write this it is just past 8:00am here in Austin, Texas. I woke up a couple of hours ago and got out of bed. It was quiet for a minute until the other two in the house got up. I was sitting in the recliner as that was the only seat in the house that agreed with how I was physically feeling. As I was sitting there I watched a few short videos on Instagram. I love Instagram because I can pick and choose who inspires me. Today I chose Dr. Joe Dispenza and Gary Vaynerchuk. I looked through my feed stopping to read posts from others who inspire me and thought it a good start to the day.

I started thinking about books. Books I’ve read and books I am reading and books I want to read. Books can be very inspiring. Today as I sit here I have several books in progress. As I was thinking about the books in my life and how the content has changed so drastically from 100% fiction to about 20% fiction and 80% non-fiction, I realized that even in fiction there is inspiration.

When I started on my entrepreneur journey, I stopped reading fiction. After a while, life just did not feel right. I was never out of my head. My imagination started to turn off. It was just plain old weird. 

A great piece of fiction can inspire and bring joy and hope with a smattering of confidence. It awakens the imagination as the mind has to create the pictures that go with the story.  Fiction is almost always about winning in some way. Even in a trashy romance novel there is a win with a lot of angst and joy along the way.

I am a pretty conservative person. I have strong beliefs about a lot of things. Never in a million years did I think I would ever read a book written by Michelle Obama. I had so devalued her because of her less than conservative beliefs and just because she was a Democrat. Yep I said it. I never gave her a chance. So as I turned on the audio book, Becoming, I allowed my heart and mind to open up to this woman. I wanted to know what she had to say about herself. I made it less than one minute into the narration before I was almost in tears. I realized how I allowed preconceived notions to get in the way of my heart and mind. She had a cause and she stuck to it. I am sure we disagree on many, many things but she is as human as I am, and as vulnerable. I can learn and grow from her experiences regardless of her beliefs.

We as humans have our thoughts and opinions. I believe we are all pretty narrowminded, especially when it comes to ourselves. We have these opinions about who we are, what we can and cannot do, and what we should and should not do. We stick to these opinions so fiercely they start to kill our dreams. It enables us to allow our peers to so influence us that we stop thinking for ourselves and just follow the pack.

My challenge to you is to leave your opinions and venture out and learn something new. Take the time to discover what drives that one person that makes your hair stand on end when you hear the name. Learn why it makes you feel that way. Take time to really dive deep into who you are and what you are really all about. I am sure you will find that there is far more to you than meets the eye and that you are truly awesome.

I know I am.