Learn Your Greatest Fear

The quickest way to learn about yourself is to find out what you're afraid of. Some people are terrified of drowning and stay as far away from pools as they can. Some people are afraid of creepy crawly things and scream very loudly when a spider comes into view. Me? I'm afraid of screwing up.

It doesn't really matter what your fear is. The reaction is usually the same. Your mind races. You start to make excuses for why you can't, why you need out. It's fight or flight. You might even notice some anger building up in to propel you to stick it out.

Fear triggers all your defense mechanisms. It's a physiological response to protect your ego, your person. But sometimes it just causes more problems then we'd like to admit.

You have to know your fears so you can learn to work within them. If you're afraid of water and your plane crashes in the ocean, you're going to need to stay calm and tread water or swim to safety. If you panic or freeze, you use your energy up too quickly or you just sink straight away.

For me, awareness is helpful. If I know I'm scared, I can allow the feeling to take place without acting on it, without it consuming me or becoming dramatic. I can remind myself that I'll be ok and wait patiently for that truth to come to pass.

Fear not, this too will pass...

Fear Leaves You Uninspired

I've been talking to a number of people lately experiencing the recession... I suppose that's a euphemism for saying that a lot of the people I'm close with are finding themselves hard up in this economy.  

In these conversations, my peers want to share their stories, their feelings, but something stops them.  There's this sense that others don't want to hear about battered finances and unemployment checks--that others would look at them differently, like they somehow deserved to be laid off or it's their fault for not saving.  Blame the victim.

Mostly, we're expecting our parents' generation to collectively hop out from behind a bookshelf and yell we told you so.  

So we keep quiet instead--saying nothing about our fears in public. Because money and fear are taboo.

And none of this is helping.  People are terrified that they won't be able to make rent and are too afraid to talk about it.  

I think it's time to break this silence.  

Say something people! :-)