Taming the wild beast called "Fear"

For whatever the reason, it seems that this week many of my clients had a similar thread in our conversations: fear. We had to do some digging to figure out what exactly was going on, but here's what I do know. For the most part, we all fall into two categories: we fear we aren't good enough or we fear we won't be loved. When we fear that we aren't good enough, we think that we don't deserve good things. And when we don't address our fears, we stay stuck. So here are my thoughts about fear...

Fear is a blessing. Just like my daughter cried when she was hungry as a baby and my dog barks when she's trying to tell me something, that was how they tried to communicate with me because they didn't have a language. Fear communicates to us through feeling. And when you're feeling it, it's just your soul trying to communicate to you that you're being guided. You can let it paralyze you or you can address it, work through it, and take action.

When I was working in Corporate America and dying to leave, I knew that I wanted acting to be my next act (pun intended). But I was terrified. And because fear and I have a long history, I knew that fear was telling me that this was exactly what I needed to do. Action is the best antidote. So, I quit my soul-crushing job and jumped right in. Now, that doesn't mean it was all rainbows and butterflies after. I left a six-figure salary job and excellent health insurance to go into something with absolutely no guarantees on when any income would next come in. I had to get creative, I had to cut back my living expenses, and for the first time in my life, I had to become financially dependent on someone. Those things scared the living crap out of me. But fear doesn't mean to stop what we're doing. As I once read in a book I loved (and highly recommend!), Everything is Figureoutable, "Fear is not the enemy. Waiting to stop feeling afraid is." That's where we get stuck. When we're waiting to stop feeling afraid. But another tool I learned from that book is to write up a list of your worst-case scenarios that could happen to you if you move ahead with what you're excited about but is equally terrifying you, then write down what would happen if that worst-case scenario thing happened, and then flip that switch and make a list of what your best-case scenario would be if you did the thing that's terrifying you. Chances are that list of the best-case scenario things would be things that would offer you a happy and fulfilling life.

So, next time you're feeling stuck, anxious or have that fear, try it out. It just might end up leading you to realizing that dream.