Naked Determination, 41 Stories About Overcoming Fear

Naked Determination

41 Stories About Overcoming Fear

By

Gisela Hausmann

Copyright © 2011 & 2023 by Gisela Hausmann

Published by Educ-Easy Books

POB 6366

Greenville, SC 29606

https://giselahausmann.com

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ISBN 978-0-9664217-5-0 (EPub)

ISBN 978-0-9664217-6-7 (Kindle)

ISBN 978-0-9912724-0-2 (paperback)

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All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronical, mechanical, recording, or otherwise) without prior permission of the copyright owner and the publisher of this book.

The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law.

Editors:

Divya Lavanya M.

Anna Hausmann

Ebook formatting by ebooklaunch.com

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Copyright Attributions:

Girl behind red rose by Stas Ponomarencko

Red paper plane changing direction by Mr. Thanakorn Kotpootorn

Potala Palace in Lhasa by gyn9037

All planets of Solar System by 42videography

Riomaggiore in the Cinque Terre National Park by marcociannarel

Ivory matt surface texture by h.yegho

Business people and humanoid AI robot by Stokkete

Innovative industry robots by Blue Planet Studio

Automatic human-like robot in a classroom by VesnaArt

Biz meet with employees and a humanoid robot by Alexander Limbach

Concept of psychological support thanks to A.I. by Stock-Asso

Artificial Intelligence background by paulista

Digital contents concept by metamorwork

Set of sticky notes by Brovko Serhii

Historic travel pictures: Gisela Hausmann

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Many thanks to WirtschaftsBlatt Medien GmbH & photographer Erich Reismann for granting permission to reprint the newspaper clip in the chapter: WORKING WITH A VISIONARY.

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This book is a motivational life-skills book based on autobiographical experiences. The names and details of some individuals have been changed to respect their privacy.

All views and opinions expressed in this book are those of the author. The book’s guidance is informational and educational in nature and should not be used as a substitute for the advice of financial advisors, lawyers, or other recognized professional experts in their fields, who have been fully informed about all relevant facts of your individual situation.

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THANK YOU!

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A HUGE thank you to my fans,

who appreciate my naked books

thereby pushing for a world with less fluff;

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Special thanks to my editor, Divya Lavanya M.,

who puts up with my delivering manuscripts late, again and again;

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Onward and Upwards!

To Your Success!

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Gisela Hausmann continues to impress her growing list of readers, including this one. Hausmann has a rare ability to convey even the most complex thoughts with wonderful clarity. I am a huge fan; FIVE STARS all the way.

— Novelist Jack Engelhard, author of Indecent Proposal

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…Few other inspirational titles hold this special combination of linking life-changing events with the mental processes that go into absorbing them and creating a new paradigm for change.

‘Naked Determination’ isn’t your usual collection: on so many levels it’s much more personal, specific, and approachable. The chapter-concluding post-it notes on simple lessons learned hit much more powerfully as afterwords of the author’s many encounters in life.

Any who want a truly readable, inspirational collection that pairs autobiography with motivation for change will find this a key acquisition.

— D. Donovan, eBook Reviewer, Midwest Book Review

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The biggest praise I can give it is to say, Place it beside ‘The Alchemist’ in your bookshelf. Or rather your e-book shelf.

— Manohar Venkat, Indian Blogger @ Taking Time to Imagine ;)

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FOREWORD

Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it.

Boldness has genius, power and magic in it.

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

I originally penned Naked Determination: 41 Stories About Overcoming Fear because I wanted to help others overcome the many fears which keep hindering us from making our dreams come true.

And boy, oh boy, didn’t I know way too much about fears and being afraid!

Though life was good until I was thirty-eight years old – hard work led me to build two great careers, plus, I also met the man of my dreams with whom I had two beautiful children – it all came crashing down in November 2000 when, unexpectedly, my husband died.

Suddenly, I was the head of my family who was supposed to solve all problems, alone by myself, even those I never knew existed. And, since Florian and I immigrated to the United States, there wasn’t any family who could help.

Fear became a constant companion; most often the worry was, How am I going to pay for this or that?

Moreover, there weren’t enough hours in my days to tackle everything I needed to do – be the best parent I could be, go to work, cook, clean, shuttle my children to wherever they needed or wanted to go, take care of the yard, and do all the other things.

The year after Florian died, I didn’t even manage to take down the Christmas tree and put our approximately one-hundred ornaments into their respective boxes until mid-April the following year; and when I finally did, I only pushed myself to make the time so Santa and the Easter Bunny wouldn’t have to share our living room.

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Years later, when I read Sheryl Sandberg’s book ‘Option B,’ I felt terrible for her that she too lost her husband at a young age, but I also came to the conclusion that she didn’t have the faintest idea what the lives of young widows (or widowers), who weren’t billionaires like her, were really like. ‘Being resilient’ is a lot easier when one can afford taking care of ‘issues’ – with a billion dollars in the bank.

But, never minding the difficulties, I kept chugging along until I finally figured out how I could overcome my fears. My trick was to think about how I used to solve problems in the past, when my world was still whole.

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Fear is almost always the result of not knowing what’s going to happen.

For example, when we get laid off, like I was during the Great Recession, it isn’t losing the job that scares us but the uncertainty of whether we’ll find a new job quickly and/or have the funds to ‘survive’ until that time. Occasionally, we might even feel scared when good things happen. For example, when we get promoted, we might worry if we can handle our new job requirements or if we’ll make a fool of ourselves.

Worst of all – especially when we are in a difficult phase of our lives, we tend to get scared more often because when we are vulnerable, even small problems carry the potential to derail us.

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So, to overcome my fears and to assure myself that I could tackle the tasks at hand, I trained myself to stop ‘believing in myself’ and instead, began ‘confirming’ to myself that, I KNOW that I can deal with this or that situation! If I could overcome difficulties even when I was an ignorant teenager I can also deal with this aggravating thing that’s up right now.

More than once I told myself, I used to travel the world – with a backpack, not with a tourist group. If I was able to buy train tickets in Harbin, China, where at the time, nobody spoke English, most certainly, I am capable of acing this job interview.

On other occasions, I reminded myself, Gisela, you trimmed back a thirty-foot Mahogany tree, alone by yourself. If you could do that, you can also open this under-sink trap and find out what’s blocking the water flow.

It worked. Not all the time, but a lot more often than not.

Eventually, the most amazing thing happened – I made it! Both my children graduated high school and were ready to begin their lives as adults. And so, for the first time in more than a decade, I got to reflect on my journey of learning to overcome fears.

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At first, I tried self-help books and courses because I thought they’d help me overcome my tragic loss while also struggling with a never-ending stream of ‘issues.’ But while these courses helped me in finding at least ‘some emotional peace,’ they did nothing for me with regards to dealing with my daily problems. Somehow, the creators of these courses seemed to ignore major parts of people’s reality.

For example, almost all courses recommended or even commanded – Prioritize! Which is easy to say, when one isn’t a single parent who, upon coming home from a rough day at work, learns that one of the children accidentally dropped a fluted glass into the dishwasher, hence glass pieces are jamming up the dishwasher’s chopper unit, and the other child forgot to study for a test that’ll be given the next day. Or other ‘minor catastrophes.’

Indeed, I believed that not even Steve Jobs would have been able to achieve what he accomplished had he had to take on the duties of a single parent on top of his work – only every other weekend. And maybe he thought the same and for this reason initially denied paternity of his daughter Lisa.

Another often repeated advice was – Believe in yourself! Of course, that’s good advice, but isn’t ‘knowing’ better than ‘believing’?

Since we know that our own stories are true, remembering the ideas and tricks that worked for us in the past is much more effective than listening to self-declared ‘experts’ or ‘gurus’ who might be exaggerating or flat out lying. Also, reminding ourselves of past successes helps us in gaining confidence.

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So, that’s why I decided to publish the stories from which I learned the most.

The first edition of this book Naked Determination: 41 Stories About Overcoming Fear, published in November 2012, won two book awards, received a 4.7***** star ranking on Amazon and a 4.3***** ranking on Goodreads and, judging from the reviews, did what it was supposed to do – remind readers that they weren’t as powerless as some participants of our society try to portray large numbers of the ‘99 percent.’

Publishing Naked Determination also helped me in launching a writer’s career, a ‘career’ as an Amazon top reviewer, and subsequently getting featured in many regional, national, and international publications including Success (print magazine), Entrepreneur, and on Bloomberg’s podcast ‘Decrypted.’

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But that was then. In the eleven years since I released this book, the world has changed dramatically and with it we find new opportunities as well as new fears that plague us.

That’s why I decided to update this book. Of course, it would be preposterous to claim that I have all answers to deal with the ever-increasing influence of corporate power, to fight the climate disaster most effectively, or to deal with the latest problem – the coming AI revolution which none of us has experienced yet. But I found some good combat strategies, which I already practice, and which seem to work.

This book is still the same motivational life-skills book I wrote in 2012. Only five stories have been exchanged and now present my ways of dealing with the newly emerging ‘issues.’ They are presented in the chapter group The Future 2.0.

Have fun and please share your stories too!

Gisela Hausmann

CONTENTS

(Though this book is largely chronological, there are a few jumps and gaps.)

Life Skills:

BACK TO BASICS

Trust yourself

Form Alliances

Know your destination

Logistics is key

ESSENTIAL SKILLS

The guts to ask

Is timing of the essence?

Trying to find somebody who speaks the same language

Smile!

PERSONAL EVOLUTION

Red shoes and Don King’s hair

Weight issues

Fire your shrink and buy yourself a chainsaw

Don’t ask the devil’s advocate

AFFAIRS, SEX AND LOVE

My case for affairs

My search for the question one cannot ask…

Beware of fairy tales

Finding ‘the one’

PROFESSIONAL LIFE

Work with a visionary

The great story

In the privacy of your office

Jumping over hurdles

MONEY

Financial discipline

Does money lie on the street?

What do we really need?

Investing in ‘electric energy’

OVERCOMING ADVERSITY

Unpleasantness is just a concept

When life hits you with a glaciating freeze

Conquering problems

Vanquishing rejection

EMBRACING UNDERRATED VIRTUES

Respect

Easy Generosity

Giving credit where credit is due

Kindness in the face of disaster

THE FUTURE

Is our blue planet’s color fading?

Trees lead to hope

Seize the moment!

How to Stay Motivated?

THE FUTURE 2.0

Buying insurance against what is to come…

Corporations, clever ideas, and contracts

My disappointment with the watchdog

How to reduce the danger of what AI could do to us

In light of these developments

About the Author

Other books

BACK TO BASICS

Trust yourself

Form alliances

Know your destination

Logistics is key

TRUST YOURSELF

"… when you go out all the way…"

It was the summer of 1968. I was six years old and spent most of my school vacation days at the public pool, which I loved.

In those days – before global warming – winters could be freezing cold in my birth country Austria. Hence not having to ‘dress up,’ wearing just a bathing suit and hanging out at the pool felt like spending time at a luxurious vacation resort.

The only downside of this fun was that I was under strict orders to never enter the big pool alone by myself. Though I had tried to learn to swim since I was four, I just couldn’t muster enough trust in myself to let go of my floating device.

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Then one fine day, ‘it’ happened. As I strolled through the public pool grounds, checking out what everybody was doing, my eyes fell on the diving tower. A question popped up in my mind. – What kind of a view would I have from up there?

Hm…

Could I?

Should I? …

Though I could not swim, I could read very well for my age. The sign, which was posted at the bottom, said, Swimmers Only.

Right! … But surely the view from up there would be magnificent…

I inspected the tower again. There were three diving opportunities: a 3-meter board, a 5-meter platform and the immensely high 10-meter platform at the very top.

As I thought through my options, I realized I could not get on that 3-meter board because kids were lined up there. Once one walked to the end of the diving board, one had to jump. The 10-meter platform wasn’t really an option either because the lifeguard watched who went up there.

That left the 5-meter platform! There were children my size up there. Of course, they could swim and I couldn’t! But what if I made my most-confident face, climbed up there, looked around, and then – climbed down again? I had seen kids doing that.

My plan was a plan! With my most courageous expression, I climbed up the two ladders to the 5-meter platform.

What a great idea this was! At first, I cautiously leaned against the concrete tower that supported the 10-meter platform. I could see my grandmother resting on the lawn and reading a book. She was far away. I giggled. This is fun! She has no idea that I am up here!

The other children on the platform did not pay attention to me even though I felt like I had an ‘I cannot swim’-sign posted on my forehead. Apparently, if one had the nerve to make it up here, nobody questioned if one belonged in this space. I felt elated and got more confident.

What if I went all the way to the front of the platform? Would I be able to see better?

Slowly, I walked to the front. I wrapped my toes around the edge. Looking at everything beneath me I felt as if I was on top of the world.

Suddenly, I felt some strange movement from behind me… some swooshing motion… I glanced over my shoulder to see the face of a boy I knew well: Michael!

This Michael was my age, and he was in the boys’ classroom next to my girls’ classroom at school. He was my hometown’s little aggressive kid. I had heard that he beat up kids. Now he was swinging his arm to push me… He connected… and I was falling off the tower.

The water glistened beautifully. It was also coming closer rapidly.

I was astonished at how many thoughts I could think in the brink of a second.

No! I will not drown! (I had seen divers jump from all levels of the tower. Each one of them had come up. So I would too!)

There is the lifeguard! If I scream, he will jump into the water and get me!

Yeah, but if he rescues me, today my grandmother will know, and tomorrow (if not today) my parents will!

What