In the first year of Belshazzar king of Babylon Daniel had a dream and visions of his head upon his bed: then he wrote the dream, and told the sum of the matters.

² Daniel spake and said, I saw in my vision by night, and, behold, the four winds of the heaven strove upon the great sea.

³ And four great beasts came up from the sea, diverse one from another.

⁴ The first was like a lion, and had eagle's wings: I beheld till the wings thereof were plucked, and it was lifted up from the earth, and made stand upon the feet as a man, and a man's heart was given to it.

⁵ And behold another beast, a second, like to a bear, and it raised up itself on one side, and it had three ribs in the mouth of it between the teeth of it: and they said thus unto it, Arise, devour much flesh.

⁶ After this I beheld, and lo another, like a leopard, which had upon the back of it four wings of a fowl; the beast had also four heads; and dominion was given to it.

⁷ After this I saw...

OVERCOMING NEGATIVE INNER DIALOGUE 

ARE YOU PLAYING TO WIN OR PLAYING NOT TO LOSE?

In high school I wrestled in the Washington State Wrestling Championships. I was winning my match 4 to 0. At the half way point, rather than continuing to increase my lead I got scared. I didn't want to make any mistakes so rather than wrestling to win, I was wrestling to not lose.

I made some mistakes and eventually lost my match 5 to 4.

Looking back on this experience, the powerful lesson I learned is to play the game of life to win vs. not to lose. In other words, to choose faith over fear.

Making decisions out of fear does not feel good. Fear will limit your creativity and your potential. In my case, it created a self-fulfilling prophecy. I was afraid to make mistakes. I was afraid to lose my wrestling match and in the end, I did.

When you are scared, take a moment and remind yourself all of the challenges you have been through and all of them you have overcome. Remembering these things...