Fear

FEAR
by Shel Silverstein

Barnabus Browning
Was scared of drowning,
So he never would swim
Or get into a boat
Or take a bath
Or cross a moat.
He just sat day and night
With his door locked tight
And the windows nailed down,
Shaking with fear
That a wave might appear,
And cried so many tears
That they filled up the room
And he drowned.

Fear is our ultimate protector. It keeps from doing way more dumb shit than we would do otherwise. This is a good thing, when you realize how much dumb shit that you’ve done despite the protective response of fear, right?
 
But like every emotion, fear is a double-edged sword. While meant to protect us from epic stupidity, it often cripples us into trying nothing at all. It generalizes like a mother-fucker, insisting that everything around you is a potential “Danger Will Robinson!” moment. Fear can move from ultimate protector to hobgoblin asshole in 60 seconds flat.  And like the Shel Silverstein poem above, fear tricks us into thinking we are safe and then unveils itself as the little manipulator that it is…turning our fear of failure into a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Do you have fears that are taking up more of your time and your energy than you want them to have?
Are you willing to start working with them in a different way?

Ok, that was a bit of a trick question. You are still reading so that means that at some level you are (maybe, just maybe) looking at tackling a particular fear…even if your initial response in reading that questions was “Oh, hellz to the no!”

But let’s start with this. Just picture what life would like like without this fear. We call this the miracle question. If you woke up tomorrow after the Fuck Fear Fairy had visited you in your sleep and your fear was no longer part of your equation, what would you be doing? What would you be thinking? What would that feel like? How would that affect your relationships?

Here is the sneaky part. This exercise helps you figure out what you want life to look like. It may not (let’s face likely no way in hell well) happen overnight. But it DOES help us figure out how to be our own damn Fuck Fear Fairy. You are your own agent of change. You got this, rock star.
This may be a big thing. I get that. But my next question is this: What is one small doing thing that would help you get to that miracle existence of No Fear. What would be the first thing the Fuck Fear Fairy would have you do?

Seriously, small tiny itty bitty thing. But a DIFFERENT thing than what is going on now. Because shit rarely changes because of other people (unless those fuckers make it different-worse instead of different-better). But shit really can change when WE change.

Fear’s rightful place is as an information giver not decision controller. YOU are the decision controller in the end. It takes work to reclaim your autonomy from fear, but it is an absolutely doable thing.

One different doing thing. One prescription from the Fuck Fear Fairy. What’s your starting point?