Monday October 21st 6.30 - 7pm
This weekend I had the pleasure of speaking at a conference called ‘Women in Chiropractic’ in London. Not only was this the first seminar I had ever spoken at, but I was the first speaker of the day! I decided to speak about fear as this is something that has, and still does hold me back at times, and I know it is something that many of us struggle with.
If you hear or think of the word ‘fear’, what do you associate it with? I know for me, I would link this word to a negative situation, making me feel small which would likely stop me in my tracks. But what if you could flip that around, and actually associate a positive meaning to it?
I talk about this because often when we hear this word, or associated words such as ‘worry’ or ‘nervousness’, it can often cause doubt in our minds, hold us back and cause us additional stress. I have certainly experienced this in the past in many situations, but I will use the talk on Saturday as my example. You may have experienced it when thinking about signing up for your first 5k running race, considering changing your career or attending your first gym class.
To help add some context to this however, I will explain a little more about what I have learnt about fear.
Fear is actually just an emotion and is something that we all experience, it is perfectly normal! Innately we have this emotion as a survival mechanism, it keeps us safe and creates a heightened sense of awareness. For example, if we didn’t have fear, we may step out in front of moving traffic or pick up a hot pan with our bare hands resulting in injury and potentially much worse. But I have heard many people say in the past that they want to ‘eliminate their fear’, which I really do understand as I have said this myself. I have learnt to realise however, that if we try to do this, not only is it very difficult/near impossible because it is an emotion that will naturally keep appearing, but we can end up not being who we really are and actually numb our feelings.
I recently read that singer Bruce Springsteen, AKA The Boss, still gets nervous before going on stage. Bruce has been performing worldwide for years, but just before he goes out, he still gets sweaty palms and butterflies in his stomach which could certainly stop him from performing. How he deals with these emotions however, really helped to change my mindset about fear and worry, and I share this because I hope it will have the same effect for you. Bruce has conditioned himself that when he does feel the nerves, worry and fear, he actually tells himself and knows that this means he is READY to perform! Therefore, if he didn’t experience these feelings just before going on stage, he would probably be quite concerned. Bruce has created a positive association with the fear, which helps him perform at his best. It also highlights that even a top performing artist feels the same way we do! We are all in this together.
Also, what if that fear was actually a little sign that was pointing you in the right direction? What if that thought you have inside, which keeps reappearing, for example signing up for that 5k run, means you absolutely should sign up for that 5k!
For me, I got asked to speak at the event this weekend a year ago. The first thing that came into my head were the little voices saying, “what have I got to talk about?”, “I can’t speak in front of people”, “why would they want to listen to me?” and so on. But I had another feeling deep inside – call it what you like – heart, soul, gut, that told me I absolutely should do it. Thank fully I listened to this.
I used a tool which I have learnt from someone whose work has really impacted me over the last year, Marie Forleo (if you want to check out her work you can find it here https://www.marieforleo.com/).
This is a process to help work through the fear, and is something I used which really helped to break things down. I have outlined the steps below, along with my example relating to the talk, to help to add some context to it. You can use this for anything however, whether it is signing up for that run, attending the class or changing your career!
1. Ask yourself and write down, what is the thing that I am actually worried about?
For me this was speaking in front of others and worrying about what they think.
2. Once you are clear on this, write down, what are the worse case scenarios that could happen if I went through with it and took action?
For me this was:
3. Now on a scale of 1-10 (10 being certain that the worse case scenario will happen) rate the likelihood of the worst case scenario happening:
For me I rated this as 3/10 – so it was quite unlikely.
4. Now if the worst case scenario did happen, write down how you would deal with it, eg: what would you do to move through it?
I wrote:
5. Finally, write down all the best case scenarios that could happen if you take action:
I wrote:
Once I had taken the time to process my thoughts, I realised that what I was fearful and worrying about, actually wasn’t that bad. You will find that 9 times out of 10, the best-case scenarios heavily out way the worst case! If the worst-case scenario did happen, you are now also prepared for it and you have created strategies on how you would deal with it so there is no more uncertainty. If the uncertainty is left there, it often results in that chatter in your head which is telling you all the negative things.
Once you have completed the above, you now need to take ACTION! Action is the only remedy to fear, it is the only thing that will help move you forward and switch off that little voice inside, and the sooner you do it the better.
Going back to Saturday, I would be lying if I said wasn’t worried and nervous before speaking. As I mentioned, it was the first time I had ever formally spoken in front of a group, a group of 60 people at that! I have done a talk in the past to a mothering group, and I remember I could barely get my words out, it was awful! Studies have shown that public speaking is often people’s number one fear, even over death! And it was safe to say that I certainly fell in line with those stats.
But this weekend something was different, and I genuinely believe it was due to taking some time to listen and process my thoughts using the steps described above. My hands were shaking, and I had butterflies in my stomach, but I actually enjoyed the experience and knew that those feelings were perfectly normal, and meant I was ready to share! (Thank you Bruce). I am pleased to say it went really well.
I am writing this as I know that we all have so much potential, but often we don’t do the things that we truly want to do, because the fear and worry holds us back. My suggestion is to take a moment, and have a think if this applies to you right now? What is it that you would love to do/share/give? And then delve a little deeper to see what it is that is stopping you, as I would hate for you to have regrets later down the line.
The fear will always come back, but why not welcome it, treat it as your friend and a little sign that may be trying to guide you to somewhere new?!
I hope this is of help and I wish you a wonderful week,
With Love,
Sarah
