Welcome to part 2 of our 4 part blog series on fear. I hope that you have already created your list and you are prepared to move forward with a tangible plan. If you have not had the opportunity to read part 1, you should take a moment to do that as each of these post build upon each other. You can view part 1 here.
In my last post, I gave 3 things that we most often do when it comes to the moment of fear. The first of those is what I would like to deal with in this post which is “powering through the moment of fear.” As I stated previously, this is often what our ideal self wants. When we “power through,” we are giving ourselves a sense of strength. This is one of the reasons that we often default to this choice. I would even say that we train ourselves to power through because the ability to power through makes us feel powerful! We are telling ourselves that we are willing and able to make it happen no matter what, but is that really a solution to our fear or is this a gross misunderstanding of being determined? If we come to the place of fear and we just power through without any thought, then we must ask ourselves the question - have I actually done anything about my fear? Powering through does not give us the opportunity to truly understand our fears and therefore learn from them. Many of us who have powered through the fear moment are those of us who have learned not to actually face our fears, but instead to ignore our fears. Powering through allows us to move past fear without the requirement of actually dealing with it. Ones ability to contain the problem should not be confused as a solution to the problem.
When I was growing up, my mother would make me eat vegetables that I did not like. One such vegetable was peas. I just did not like them at all. Now, I am not sure if any of you had a mother like mine, but my mom would not allow me to leave from the table until I had made a fairly sizable dent in my portion of peas. Every time she would cook this vegetable, I just felt an overwhelming feeling of dread. When I tell you I hated peas, I mean I really hated peas. Probably the only thing I hated more than peas was Lima beans, but I digress. Now, since I figured out that there was no way that I was going to be able to win at this battle with my mother, I had to figure out how to just get through it (or to power through). She told me to try butter, that did not help! She told me to put a little salt on them, while this was better, I still did not love them. Then, one day, I made a decision to just take as many peas in my mouth as I could without gaging and eat them. I did not even try to enjoy them, I did not even work on chewing them, what mattered to me was getting them off my plate. Looking at this simple childhood decision many years later gives us some insight today. In 2 or 3 mouth fulls, I was done will all my peas. I had literally powered through my "fear", my absolute terror of this vegetable. However, I do not want us to overlook the very real issue of this approach.
Even with a clean plate, and even with my mother pleased that I had eaten my peas, I literally still hated peas! I had a tangible and legitimate result that gave temporary joy, but that did very little for me in the long term. In other words, I had made it through my moment of fear without dealing with the fear. I was not better equipped to handle the issue, I was just able to get through the moment with a technique that allowed me to tolerate the issue briefly. You may be saying to yourself “who cares, you made it through”, but this is not a long term solution. This would not be the last time my mother would cook peas just like we can not power through a moment of fear and think it is the last time that fear will try to overtake us. We have to move past a momentary solution and strive for complete victory. This is where true growth is. I do not want to just build a tolerance to fear, I want something much better - I do not want to be afraid.
For many of us, this is where we are with many issues in our lives. We have not actually dealt with them, but instead what we have done is we have learned to power through these things without any thought and therefore without any growth. This is what I am asking of you: Don't allow yourself to get past the moment (I'm done with the peas), and choose not to deal with why you were at the place of fear in the first place. The appropriate question is, “what is the solution to my fear or how do I disconnect the fear trigger?”
Go back to the list that you created after the first post in this series. I want you to pay attention to the last question you answered:
What currently triggers this fear?
This is your next step: What new habits, disciplines, conversations would need to take place in order to disconnect this trigger?
Let’s work through a quick hypothetical example:
Fear? Public Speaking
When did this start? When I failed speech class
What currently triggers this? Anytime I am asked to say anything in front of a group
What needs to change? I will get a speaking coach and practice the craft
This may come across as simple, but that last part is the tangible action that we often never do! We keep trying to “power through” instead of doing the tangible next action necessary to overcome! Don’t overthink it... You got this!
See you on the next post!