Episode 2: You Cannot Fight With Your Fear

Welcome back to Courage Is Calling!

What do you need some courage for right now? Maybe you've been thinking about a change or you've got an idea that you're toying with or a thing that you really want to say or do and all of the feelings of fear are showing up for you.

Maybe you've maybe you've dipped your toe in the water of something new and fear has got you totally frozen or unable to move past the point of that toe dip and you're ready to run back to safer shores. If that's you and you feel like there are so many swirling racing thoughts running around your head about what could go wrong, how about your own capabilities or how you might feel or make a fool out of yourself, I want to offer you some understanding today about those really very real feelings.

Listen in for the number one thing that helps when it comes to facing your fears.

+ Click here to read the transcript (note that the transcription software isn't always accurate with the Northern Irish accent I have)

Welcome back to Courage Is Calling. This is episode two, I'm not sure what it is that brought you to this podcast today, but I imagine that for whatever reason, you need some bravery for something. Maybe you've been thinking about a challenge or you've got an idea that you're toying with or thing that you really want to say or do and all of the feelings are showing up for you. Maybe you've maybe you've dipped your toe in the water of something new and fear has got you totally frozen or unable to move past the point of that toe dip. And you're actually really ready to run back to see if we're shores. If that's you and you feel like there are so many swirling racing thoughts running around your head about what could go wrong, how about your own capabilities or how you might feel or make a fool out of yourself?

I want to offer you some understanding today about those really very real feelings. So I'm going to tell you a little story.

Some of you may know that I have two kids and like most children, they give me the run around at bed time. My youngest who's five, especially she loves the bedtime shenanigans and she is genuinely just such a happy, chilled out little girl until it comes to go into bed.

And as soon as it's time for turning the lights, so it just, it starts, it kicks off. And I guess some context for this would be that for the last five years. Of her life. We have stayed with her while she goes to sleep. She co-slept with me as a baby and while she's moved into her owned Raymond Long ago and her own bed and all of that, that we've still stayed with her as she falls asleep.

And so at five years old, we've been trying to. Transition out of that because she's five night and actually bedtime ends up taking forever when we're in the room. We are a big distraction and she gets overtired. And let me tell you, there is no comfort to be crumped up in a single bed beside a five-year-old.

It's just, it's not a great same for everyone. But for her, when it comes to time for light side, we've done our stories. We've brushed our teeth. We have talked cuddled, the whole gamut. It comes to light sight on whoever is putting her to bed starts to leave the room. She just, she starts, it starts the shenanigans start and she gets really scared.

And she starts to tell us all kinds of reasons why it is not bad time to try and keep us close. And the thing about this whole process is that it's not that she can't go to sleep by herself. It's that it's new. And new things are scary. The darkest scary, even though all the doors are open and the lights are on and we're just next door in our own bedroom.

But the thing about fear is that it isn't actually really interested in what's real or what's really happening when it showing up for us. Fears, main concern is to keep us safe. And that's going to do anything and say anything it can to try and bring us back to the comfort and the CFD of the known and doing things that are outside of the known are hard to get used to.

And our brands tend to speak up at those times to tell us about the risks of the unknown. And so for the first few times we tried putting her to bed and letting her go to bed by herself to sleep by herself. Whoever was putting her to bed with just get so riled, because there was so much getting up so many excuses.

It was so much faffing a bite, and I want to change my tatties and I need to enter front drank and don't go. And all of the, all of the things that you would expect, and it would end up getting really hated. I really, really hope that other parents can relate to this. And what I realized is that when it comes to fair, actually, it's so counter intuitive to try and fight it.

Because when we try to bypass fear and think that we can fight with it, argue with it or force it into place, it's just a lost cause it's a lost cause because fear is totally erotic. It's totally erotic. And so for my daughter getting annoyed at her and her fear. It only escalates the situation even more.

And when we are moving towards something vulnerable for us or expansive for us, even something exciting for us, fear is at the ready it's at the ready and high it shows up in our brand is by. You know, mentally chucking anything out us that might help us to retreat away from this unknown territory of expansion or vulnerability back to CFD and knowing again, and fear is usually chaotic.

And it's unlikely to make a whole lot of sense, even though what we might be hearing in our heads signs, realistic or reasonable. A moderate fear often needs instead is compassion and good old information. It needs tending to like a child that's kicking off at bed time. It needs understanding it needs soothing and calm to counteract the chaos that it brings to our internal systems.

So as a parent, this means dig in real deep at the tiredest part of the day. Actually, all I want to do is go down stairs and just crash on the sofa with an episode of something. And for anyone who's feeling fear about certain things that you want to do or that you want to explore. It actually means digging deep for yourself with understanding and compassion when all of our instincts.

Actually tell us to shame ourselves for not having it together or not being more brave or not doing what we really want to do. Why are you not doing that to be, you'll never do that. Why can't you do it? Everyone else seems like they can do it. All of that shame only escalates our fear because all we want is for our fear to go away and let us get on the things.

And all I wanted. Let me tell you was for my daughter to get there faster with the bedtime retain, but she needed me to remain calm. And to not enter into the chaos, to reassure her over and over and not put gasoline on the fire of her fears by getting annoyed, but to smother them with my love and my patients as hard as it is.

And you know what, after a few nights of this digging real deep and this kind of comfort and reassurance things are actually much calmer at bedtime. And she sees that she can do it, that it CF and that we're here to respond to her if she really does need us. And that's the thing, it takes some evidence building to show that, you know, she's capable of it for her to feel less scared and associate for us.

So, when you're thinking about this next thing, that you need to be brave a bite, and you feel that rise of fear coming up, know that you have it in you to dig deep, to come alongside and underneath your fear and acknowledge it for what it is. It's your body and your brain and trying to protect you from the unknown, the vulnerable and the unfamiliar.

And you can let your fear know that you're grateful for its protection, even though gratitude might be the last thing that you're failing. If you let it know that you're grateful for its protection and that you'd like to proceed, you can kind of give your fear level, a little stroke in the proverbial heads and reassure it that you you've got it from here.

You can take it from here. I want to thank you for tuning into these pep talks. It means a lot to me that you give me space in your day and as ever, if you want to talk about your thoughts on any of these episodes, you can reach out to me on Instagram at malware ends, or you can email me on hello@melwiggins.com until next time.