Do you know what your fears are? Do you fear rejection? Abandonment? Success? Or even Failure?

Why does it matter? Let’s say you’re good at suppressing your fears and no one even knows you have any. So, does it matter if you ever acknowledge them?

Yes it does! Even if you’re good at pushing them down and forging ahead, they are keeping you from reaching your full potential. They are taking energy away from you. Your subconscious mind and your nervous system have part of their “duties” spent on dealing with your fears – either combating them or hiding them. What if you had more capacity to do the things you want to do? If you identify and and then free up your fears, you’ll free up capacity to deal with the positive things you want to deal with.

So, if you can work through your fears, you can accomplish more and ultimately even be happier. I know that when I used to have more fears, the anticipation of something I feared made my heart beat faster and my nerves were on edge. This affected how I reacted to anything else that came my way even if it was something simple and expected as part of a daily activity. Being on edge is not the same as loving to live “on the edge”. It’s much different. Living “on the edge” is a choice and brings enjoyment. The reaction by the nervous system is self-imposed because of the feelings it creates. Being “on edge” is NOT by choice (well, I suppose you could argue that it really is a choice) and the nervous system does not create enjoyable sensations.

I advocate keeping a journal. It doesn’t have to be a daily thing – that can get tedious (or it can be cathartic). But if you have a book, a diary, or whatever you want to call it, you can keep your thoughts and ideas in one place. If you notice something has particularly gotten to you, write about it. See if you can figure out what it was that bothers you. Was it something that generated some fear feelings in you or was it just something that was distasteful and not something you enjoy. If it was a fear feeling, what was it you feared? Try to get very specific. But you may start out generally and then drill down as you examine whatever pops up. Work with your stream of consciousness. At first, if you’re not used to journaling, it might not come easily. It might seem very boring and not revealing at all. But some of that could also be because you don’t want to deal with what might surface. Often it’s things that happened way in the past that are keeping us from doing all we can do in life. Wouldn’t it be liberating if we could find out what those things were and then release them? You’d have so much more energy and so much more room in your brain for creativity and for ideas to pop up.

Once you start noticing your fears, use something like denials or EFT to remove them from your mind. It will probably take some time but it’s definitely worth it. You can also try to face your fears and do things that you might not like to do. Once you do them, especially if you use something such as EFT, you’ll be able to ask yourself “what is it about this that I feared”. It will be helpful to jot down what it is you’re afraid of before you actually do the thing. Then after it’s done, you’ll be able to ask if it was as bad as you thought it was.

Fears are generally based in the past and really shouldn’t be affecting your present even though they do. You can remove them and live more in the present!

Try to work on your fears this week and see if anything comes up. Start your journal and see if it goes easy or hard. Comment below to let us all know what’s been happening.

Terrie