Fear. Innate, intuitive, exasperating. Wanna know a secret about fear? We ALL have it, and we all have a hard time with it getting in our way.
Come listen to a few creative strategies about how YOU can face your fears (big and small) and come out on top!
Hi there and happy Friday! Today is the day. It's a big day. Today is a day that will go down in history as a momentous occasion. Today, we conquer fear. Fear. That sneaky little word that starts out as scared, or intimidated. The word that means you won't be included, or the thing keeping you from reaching for more of your potential to be exposed. So, I lied a little bit, but DON'T LEAVE YET. I can't conquer YOUR fears, I only have that ability with my own. And you can conquer your own fears.
Fear is one of those things we were evolved to avoid, right? Fear equals bad. Bad things equal fear. The problem with our innate DNA now is that things that cause us to be fearful cause our body to perceive them as threats. Simple things, complex things, intimidating things, intangible things and the list goes on!! Even more complex to that, our DNA requires us to hardwire ourselves with fear in mind, so things that created a large amount of fear in us (say, childhood trauma, or a very bad experience with certain foods) can forever alert our bodies to the fact that life is dangerous, and stressful, and if we can just avoid those things we will be safe, and well.
Too bad that we can't just recode our DNA to be invincible to invisible threats! I do not have a recipe for invincibility, but I do have some information to help you clear fear, cope with fear and then face the fear.
First, let's start with clearing the fear. I am going to repeat one sentence probably a few times over the course of this episode, but more in this clear the fear section than others. Clearing the fear does not work if you are talking down to yourself. You need a nice inner voice that has some compassion here. If your mental voice is saying harsh things about how you're an adult now, and small things should not be affecting you so greatly, or even more intense dialog, clearing your fear is not going to work. You are afraid of letting people down, and YOU ARE PEOPLE. Start a nice, encouraging pep talk, and you will be able to clear your fear a little easier. Let's address the fear that could be cleared easily. why not go for the low hanging fruit? Let's start with the little things that seem to make you beat yourself up for, or the little expectations you have for yourself that you can't seem to shake or meet for that matter. For me, I have this expectation that I must know where everything in my house is or I am automatically disorganized. Let's not openly judge me for thinking that I can live in a house with four other people and think it is some tiny fear that I can't find socks when I need them. Moving right along. Is this a logical fear of my expectation? Probably not. I am not going to be in mortal danger if I can't find a pencil when I want one, or find the bag of beans I put in the back of the cupboard. I can say, I don't need that fear, but the truth is, I think it's a little fear, because most days I don't deal with it directly. It only seems to affect me when I am stressed, tired, or already at max capacity mentally. So, what do I do? How do I clear this fear when I don't deal with it regularly enough to hardwire it out. Well, when I get to the point where I am facing this fear, and I feel the tight feeling of fear of failing someone in my family, I take a deep breath, and I hold it. Yup, instead of yogi breathing, I focus on holding my breath. And then, when I am completely focused on holding my breath, I let it all out and I relax any muscle I can get to respond. ANY MUSCLE. shoulders, fingers, stomach, anything. The focused relaxation refocuses my brain on something it can control, and the fact that I am still in the same physical spot, means I am not in physical danger. Holding my breath is a training that my brain need not divert oxygen anywhere else, because I am not in danger. Forcing relaxed muscles gives my body the signal that I am not in danger. Now, this momentarily clears the fear from my body, but my brain can circle back pretty fast, so I have learned, I have to try it a few times, sometimes in extra measures just to set the tone, and reinforce the point. It's simple, takes less than two minutes and I can get on with my day. This is my strategy. I would recommend doing something that takes care of three things 1) a simple physical reminder, a sharp pinch, clasping your hands tightly, pinching your nose shut. Make it out of your ordinary, but also not so noticeable that someone will take alarm at your action. 2) Repair your sharper action with a softer one. Reassure your physical self you are okay. If you pinched, rub it out. If you clasped your hands, massage them. If you pinched your nose, breathe deeply through it three time. REinforce that you are physically safe. 3) Use calming words in your brain, repeat them to yourself, or refocus your brain by focusing on how good it feels to not have to run from a tiger right now. Then rinse and repeat as needed. That is clearing the fear.
Let's moving from clearing the fear to coping with fear. Coping mechanisms vary, and are individual. Coping mechanisms can be productive or not so productive. Let's just put some parameters around healthy coping as needing to deal with the fear trigger, not mitigating more damage later. Healthy coping mechanisms look like play. SURPRISE! I bet you didn't see that one coming with this being about play and all. Coping strategies may seem like they are avoiding the problem when in reality, they are creating room in your brain to increase your will power and help you cope in a more productive manner. Set a timer for a small amount, and do something enjoyable or new for a few minutes, with the intention of readdressing your fear when the timer says so. See if you can pinpoint why you are afraid, what you are really afraid of, or even, who may be causing the fear. Start with trying to find a cause. If that is too much, take a break again, maybe a little shorter or a little longer, you be the intuitive guide, and then go at it again. Play, get your mind off of things, but then don't forget to reward your brain with a little work. Yes I said reward, and I meant it, but that is for another episode. Play, work, play work. Maybe you feel like you make progress, maybe you don't. I don't know. I have had some deep seeded fears that only a therapist has been able to help me with, and I have had some deep fears that I literally worked myself out of with a logical pattern of thought. I am merely speaking from my own experience, but I will say that the data and the research say you have got to give your brain a little pressure release in order to have the staying power to really cope with those fears.
Okay, we've talked about strategies for clearing, coping, and now let's face those fears. At some point, you have coped enough and you are ready to face your fears. You have decided it's time. You just get right in there and you kill it. And it feels so good. And you want to ride that high into next week! Okay, but what about the rest of the times? The times when you get left out of a lunch date you wanted to go to, or the time you didn't get that raise or promotion. Or even what if you got badly hurt by someone you loved, and you are afraid it will keep happening. You are afraid to act. Big or small, outwardly significant or not, we ALL experience fear. We all have hangups, and avoidance tactics, and hedging tendencies. We ALL want to avoid the harder more seemingly hurtful path. But, what inevitably hurts us more is staying put in our fear. We can't marinate in fear and expect that the outcome is hope and joy and goodness. We have to face fear to move beyond it. There's a quote about fear not stopping death, it stops the living of life. and it's true, if you let fear of falling stop you, you would have never walked. If you let the fear of rejection stop you you would have been a lonely socially-backward child. If you let the fear of saying something wrong stop you, you would never have learned to speak. You conquered fear already to learn some large and intimidating tasks, and you can do it all again. Fear is not holding you back, you are holding you back. And yes, this is as much a pep talk for myself as anyone, because we are all in the fear boat together. We all fear things, and we all let it hinder our progression. The trick is, to knowingly step forward knowing that it may feel like falling, it may feel like defeat, but forward motion builds momentum, and standing still kills it.
Alright, I have waxed poetic long enough. I want you to take stock this weekend. Take stock of a small fear you can clear, one way you can cope with fear by playing, and then, I want you to face into the new week knowing that you are braving your fears like the rest of us can be with our fears.
Thank you for listening to my podcast today, I want to thank you especially because your listening ears have put us in the top 10% of all podcasts! That is wildly exciting! And I want to thank you for being here. Stay tuned for some upcoming treats for listeners of the Art of Play in celebration of our one year anniversary! And here's to our weekly reminder to find a way to play today!