Act as if

Sometimes the only way you can be brave is to act as if  you were brave.

We are better actors than we know.  By acting as if we were brave or kind or gentle or careful, we ease ourselves into being brave, kind, gentle and careful.

This commonsense application of a truism we all know is making its way into corporate management."The Art of Japanese Management: Applications for American Executives" (Richard Tanner Pascale, Anthony G. Athos)

From Richard Pascale's book Delivering Results:
"People are much more likely to act their way into a new way of thinking, than think their way into a new way of acting.

via O'Reilly Radar