Post by Della Wren on Mar 1, 2023 12:36:22 GMT -6
Fear in the context of self-mastery includes any feeling or thought that may prevent you from doing something you want to do. Any anxiety, stress, worry, doubt, fear, procrastination, avoidance, or any other behavior that causes you to stop, slow down, or not do what you want to do.
Yes, fear can be healthy. If there is a bear in your living room, fear is a good thing. The mind kicks in with many automatic, unconscious behaviors to help you survive the experience. That is as it should be. It's a totally normal, healthy response to something that would be a truly scary experience. However, this is over-kill when we're talking about normal daily life, but the mind uses those same types of strategies anyway and we need to figure out how to manage that. We need to be able to have conscious control over what we're doing the majority of the time.
When we go to do something new or make some change in our lives, the mind immediately kicks in with all the reasons why not. It naturally wants to focus on the problems and the excuses. It even drudges up failures in the past and the things that didn't work out to make sure you understand that moving forward isn't a good idea. The mind is protecting you from the proverbial bear in the living room. But the thing is you're just making a change or starting a new project, all that fear is just keeping you stuck and not really serving a purpose. It's okay to be a little nervous, but you don't need to be afraid for your life. Do you see the difference?
So many of us out there buy into this fear and we get stuck because of it. The mind brings up those past experiences or memories and those are the things that get you to buy in because you remember that experience and it triggers the emotion that validates the fear. Now you're stuck. The mind can stop you by simply reminding you of what happened the last time because you let it do this.
This is why I have a whole board on managing the mind. The mind has a strategy that its using to do what it thinks is protecting you. What it actually does more often than not, is just keep you stuck in pain. The mind would much rather be somewhere familiar than somewhere unknown. Even if your current reality sucks and causes you a ton of pain, the mind will try to keep you there because that is known territory. It's not that it's a good place to be, it's just not unknown. In our normal daily life, the unknown is what scares the mind the most. It protects you from that the same way it tries to protect you from the bear.
By learning to redirect the mind to focus on something positive or helpful, it can help to manage that fear. Now we're not going for what some call "toxic positivity". What we're trying to do is look for a way around the fear so that we can move forward successfully. If we can find value in the experience that we want to have, it can help us manage the fear because it focuses away from all the problems and clutter the mind tries to throw at us. What you're doing is giving your brain something to do that's constructive so that the mind isn't just meddling with things and causing trouble.
I often use the example of jumping into a cold pool. What's the value of the reward of jumping into the pool? You get to go swimming with your friends/family. You understand the reward and so it is unlikely that the mind is going to completely stop you from getting in the pool. It still might take a bit, but you'll get there eventually. Can you do that in those other scenarios in your life?
When you're starting a new project, what's the value in getting started? What's the value in the project? And no, it's not the potential future outcome 5-years down the road. What's the value right here, right now? Find value in the things that are closer to you instead of looking for the value in the outcome of your 5-year plan. That future outcome 5-years from now doesn't have nearly as much value to you as the more short term goal you have in place. It's not that the long-term isn't important, it's just that there are far too many tripping hazards between here and there. It gives the mind far too much fuel to use to stop you.
Narrowing your focus on the short-term value in the smaller goals helps to keep the fear under control. It helps to keep you in balance in the present moment. When I write books, I can't focus on a finished book because that's 200 pages from where I'm starting from. I have to find the value in that first paragraph, page or first chapter. I have to be able to be okay with the smaller pieces because if I overwhelm myself with the larger goal, I'm going to get stuck. I may not be afraid of writing books anymore, but there are definitely too many obstacles between page 1 and 200 to focus on page 200 when I'm on page 1.
Putting balance in your focus helps you to manage fear. Looking for short-term goals and finding the value in those will help keep you from getting overwhelmed. The overwhelm can cause fear. It can cause you to be afraid of getting more overwhelmed. It's not that the long term goal isn't important. Yes, completing the book is important, but if I focus there, I'll never complete the book. Having a long term plan means creating short term goals. Using those short term goals as your focus along the way, allows you to manage the fear, anxiety, and stress that might show up.
The purpose of the long term goal is to fuel you to deal with the short term problems. The reason I started healing was that I had a long-term goal. I wanted to be okay in my own skin. I wanted to be able to make my own choices. I wanted to live my life on my own terms. If I had focused there for the last 8-years, I would still be stuck back there somewhere because there were a lot of smaller steps that I had to take to reach those bigger goals and I would have tripped on the fear of it all. The long term goal is what fueled me to manage the short-term problems. When things got hard, I focused back on the reason why I was doing it in the first place, and it gave me what I needed to keep going.
Even if you don't have a concrete outcome you can still do this. I didn't know what "making my own choices" looked like. I didn't know what "being okay in my own skin" felt like. I didn't really have concrete goals, I just knew I didn't want to be where I was and that was enough to get me to push through all the smaller things that showed up along the way.
What's stopping you? What are you afraid of? Where's your focus?
What you focus on matters because it determines how much fuel the mind has to stop you with. The mind doesn't have to stop you but you have to make the choice to not listen to it and move forward anyway.
You can do it. Just keep right on going.
Love to all.
Della
Yes, fear can be healthy. If there is a bear in your living room, fear is a good thing. The mind kicks in with many automatic, unconscious behaviors to help you survive the experience. That is as it should be. It's a totally normal, healthy response to something that would be a truly scary experience. However, this is over-kill when we're talking about normal daily life, but the mind uses those same types of strategies anyway and we need to figure out how to manage that. We need to be able to have conscious control over what we're doing the majority of the time.
When we go to do something new or make some change in our lives, the mind immediately kicks in with all the reasons why not. It naturally wants to focus on the problems and the excuses. It even drudges up failures in the past and the things that didn't work out to make sure you understand that moving forward isn't a good idea. The mind is protecting you from the proverbial bear in the living room. But the thing is you're just making a change or starting a new project, all that fear is just keeping you stuck and not really serving a purpose. It's okay to be a little nervous, but you don't need to be afraid for your life. Do you see the difference?
So many of us out there buy into this fear and we get stuck because of it. The mind brings up those past experiences or memories and those are the things that get you to buy in because you remember that experience and it triggers the emotion that validates the fear. Now you're stuck. The mind can stop you by simply reminding you of what happened the last time because you let it do this.
This is why I have a whole board on managing the mind. The mind has a strategy that its using to do what it thinks is protecting you. What it actually does more often than not, is just keep you stuck in pain. The mind would much rather be somewhere familiar than somewhere unknown. Even if your current reality sucks and causes you a ton of pain, the mind will try to keep you there because that is known territory. It's not that it's a good place to be, it's just not unknown. In our normal daily life, the unknown is what scares the mind the most. It protects you from that the same way it tries to protect you from the bear.
By learning to redirect the mind to focus on something positive or helpful, it can help to manage that fear. Now we're not going for what some call "toxic positivity". What we're trying to do is look for a way around the fear so that we can move forward successfully. If we can find value in the experience that we want to have, it can help us manage the fear because it focuses away from all the problems and clutter the mind tries to throw at us. What you're doing is giving your brain something to do that's constructive so that the mind isn't just meddling with things and causing trouble.
I often use the example of jumping into a cold pool. What's the value of the reward of jumping into the pool? You get to go swimming with your friends/family. You understand the reward and so it is unlikely that the mind is going to completely stop you from getting in the pool. It still might take a bit, but you'll get there eventually. Can you do that in those other scenarios in your life?
When you're starting a new project, what's the value in getting started? What's the value in the project? And no, it's not the potential future outcome 5-years down the road. What's the value right here, right now? Find value in the things that are closer to you instead of looking for the value in the outcome of your 5-year plan. That future outcome 5-years from now doesn't have nearly as much value to you as the more short term goal you have in place. It's not that the long-term isn't important, it's just that there are far too many tripping hazards between here and there. It gives the mind far too much fuel to use to stop you.
Narrowing your focus on the short-term value in the smaller goals helps to keep the fear under control. It helps to keep you in balance in the present moment. When I write books, I can't focus on a finished book because that's 200 pages from where I'm starting from. I have to find the value in that first paragraph, page or first chapter. I have to be able to be okay with the smaller pieces because if I overwhelm myself with the larger goal, I'm going to get stuck. I may not be afraid of writing books anymore, but there are definitely too many obstacles between page 1 and 200 to focus on page 200 when I'm on page 1.
Putting balance in your focus helps you to manage fear. Looking for short-term goals and finding the value in those will help keep you from getting overwhelmed. The overwhelm can cause fear. It can cause you to be afraid of getting more overwhelmed. It's not that the long term goal isn't important. Yes, completing the book is important, but if I focus there, I'll never complete the book. Having a long term plan means creating short term goals. Using those short term goals as your focus along the way, allows you to manage the fear, anxiety, and stress that might show up.
The purpose of the long term goal is to fuel you to deal with the short term problems. The reason I started healing was that I had a long-term goal. I wanted to be okay in my own skin. I wanted to be able to make my own choices. I wanted to live my life on my own terms. If I had focused there for the last 8-years, I would still be stuck back there somewhere because there were a lot of smaller steps that I had to take to reach those bigger goals and I would have tripped on the fear of it all. The long term goal is what fueled me to manage the short-term problems. When things got hard, I focused back on the reason why I was doing it in the first place, and it gave me what I needed to keep going.
Even if you don't have a concrete outcome you can still do this. I didn't know what "making my own choices" looked like. I didn't know what "being okay in my own skin" felt like. I didn't really have concrete goals, I just knew I didn't want to be where I was and that was enough to get me to push through all the smaller things that showed up along the way.
What's stopping you? What are you afraid of? Where's your focus?
What you focus on matters because it determines how much fuel the mind has to stop you with. The mind doesn't have to stop you but you have to make the choice to not listen to it and move forward anyway.
You can do it. Just keep right on going.
Love to all.
Della