Karl’s note: This post was inspired by the book, “Dibs in Search of Self,” by Virginia Axline.

First, let me say it doesn’t matter who Dibs is. It doesn’t matter because as you read the book you connect with the character of Dibs. You saw yourself through his story.

What does matter is what you do with this knowledge.

Before I lose you…I know this is a career development site. Let me explain who Dibs is. Dibs is a young boy who went into therapy because his parents thought that he was mentally defective. (Spoiler alert!). He was actually a genius. The book was created to help play therapy counselors understand how play therapy can build a kid’s confidence and awareness.

For those of you who want a little back story, Dibs In Search of Self is a book that was written in 1963 about a young boy who communicated with his parents by screaming at them or ignoring them. He was a lost soul that needed help.

Why?

You are probably wondering why I’m writing about a book that is over 40 years old and why I’m writing about some 5 year old kid from over 4 decades ago. Because the book exposes what many people think about themselves. The reason I read the book is because my wife is a counselor and was required to read the book for one of her classes.

The book is relevant because of how the reader sees himself through the boy’s eyes. We all struggle to be accepted. We allow people to hurt us.

Most of us let our arch nemesis dictate our happiness. You do this because you are afraid to live a better life. Your arch nemesis power comes from your past. You’ve learned how to communicate with yourself in the way that kills your confidence.

So, Dibs’ therapist recorded the sessions and put them into a book that thousands of counselors have read. These counselors influence the direction of our children’s lives. You must understand the importance of what Dibs represents. I want you to understand that what you see in Dibs, you see in yourself.

Your career is filled with pain, happiness and love. The best way you can be open to all these emotions is if you are willing to analyze your reactions to this book.

This book of course isn’t the only book that does this. We see ourselves through Seth Godin, Malcolm Gladwell, and Anthony Robbins because we want to unleash our superpowers. We either relate and build a stronger and smarter life or we fold like a thin cracker and go crawl in the corner to cry ourselves to sleep.

Your Career

Your career is dependent on how truthfully and confidently you think of your superpowers. If you don’t believe that you are here to do great things then you should stop reading now. This article is for people who think they are special.

I’m not talking about becoming president. That would be great and all, but I’m talking about wanting to improve people’s lives, wanting them to be happier than their parents, and improving on each generation’s overall happiness.

So let’s get back to the beginning.

Dibs

Dibs’ parents brought him to this therapist to figure out his problem. The therapist recorded the sessions, changed his name, and everyone is curious about who he is today.

It turns out Dibs was a genius. He was able to read by the age of 2. He was so smart that by age 6 he dumbed down his artwork in first grade so the other kids wouldn’t realize how smart he was. He wanted the kids to like him so he played on their level. The way you see how his mind work’s through the author’s eyes is an amazing journey.

Dibs’ therapist showed him that just being himself was ok. It was better than ok; it was the easiest way to live.

What We Really See

This book holds a little bit of each of us within it. I couldn’t read by the time I was 2  and I didn’t hold back my ability to read middle school material in first grade, but I’ve held back in other areas. I’ve held back because I was afraid. Fear plays such a huge role in our lives that we can’t ignore these feelings. Click here to check out the course that I created with Nathan Hangen that we recently launched.

You’ve probably held yourself back to fit in at work or school. I know you’ve been there because you were afraid of the back lash that might occur. We’ve all been there. We don’t want to put ourselves out there to be judged.

You have amazing superpowers that need to be shared with the world. Figuring out how to make this happen isn’t easy, I know that, but it’s the best way for you to really discover who you are and what makes you happy.

Finish Line

In the end of any career, that’s how we judge our actions. Were we happy?

Isn’t that what life comes down to at the end of a day, year and life time?

Memory is a fickle friend because most of us look back and see the good times, forgetting the ugly memories. This can be good, but under exposing the truth of what we really need is just as bad. You must really listen to your needs, search deep inside yourself and ask, “Am I happy with the work that I am doing?”

Your answer will eventually come if you sit long enough and really listen to your thoughts. When the answer does come, the next step is creating a plan that gets you so excited that you have to act. You have to make changes to align your values with the work that you do every day.

Once you are in alignment, you will feel like you are playing instead of working. You will be living a dream that you didn’t think was possible.

Dibs felt safe with the therapist because she accepted whatever he did. She didn’t judge.

You need to accept who you are. You have to accept your superpowers and not be afraid to unleash them into the world. We need you now more than ever. Who cares what your co-workers and friends think of your crazy idea, let it out and make this world a better place.

Do you take time to listen to your thoughts? (Meditation)

Do you plan time for reflection? (1 sentence journal)

Do you need to make a change in your career?

What is the first thing you can do to unleash your superpowers and happiness?

* Follow me on Twitter. Join over 3,600 people who get happiness tips, productivity tips, and thought provoking quotes each day.

* Email is a pain in all our butts. We love it and hate it all at the same time. It’s not going away so we may as well learn to tame it. Check out Stephen’s post about taming the email monster.

If you found this post insightful, you will probably like these too:

> 10 Common Career Mistakes

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We can’t live freely. No one can. We need self constructed rules, so our brains don’t explode.

We all need rules in order to feel comfortable. Even your favorite A-list movie star lives within rules that a regular person can’t even fathom.

You tell yourself that you can’t ask your boss for a raise.

You tell yourself that you can’t find a better job that matches your superpowers.

You tell yourself that you don’t need to love what you do.

You function well within this mental cage. You don’t want to be able to live a fully unrestricted life because it would be too free.

The problem is that your self-created cage is too small. You don’t see the little door behind the couch. The door that opens up to the perfect playground. Those cool monkey bars that challenge your muscles. Those cool puzzles that challenge your mind.

Usual Walk

As I walked my usual walk with my dog, I thought of taking a different route. However, the more I thought about it the more that I didn’t like the idea. I wanted to take the same route. I liked the houses I walked past. I liked the same trees. I didn’t want to walk a new route. I didn’t want new houses and trees to distract me. I need to think and let my mind unravel.

The regular route allows me to tap into my subconscious.

We complain about cubicles, co-workers and bosses, but many of us really need these things. We need them because it’s what we are used to. At least for right now.

This may seem bleak, but we can’t always be bold. Sometimes it hurts too much. We need to pick our spots. We choose actions that give us the best chance of at success. Most of the time we are cautious. We don’t want to put ourselves too far out on a limb to only end up failing.

This isn’t a terrible thing. We don’t want to stick our arms out of the cage in the darkness and get them bitten off.

We want to reach out and grab a dream that makes us happy. However, if we grabbed after every dream our heads would spin right off. So we allow ourselves to be wimpy and to take the easy route.

99% of the time this is a good thing. We make the safe choice and we get to keep our hand.

Picking Your Spots

We begin to have problems when we take the safe route too often, going through the unknown door to satisfy our curiosity is a much needed part of a career. We look around at our self constructed cages and say, “This is quite nice. I have a refrigerator with some decent snacks, a working toilet, a 401k, a Wii, and a car that helps me feel like I’m escaping my cage.” We tell ourselves that we don’t really need to see what’s behind the door.

But we are just fooling ourselves.

We pretend we are happy because we are afraid of getting hurt.

Your cage may be fine right now, but at some point you should go find a new shell. One that’s going to help you grow.

Yes, as you’ve probably guessed, I’m talking about your career. If you aren’t challenged by your work then you aren’t using your superpowers to help others. You’re coasting along enjoying the cozy confines of your cage.

Your Cousin the Hermit Crab

You are no different from a hermit crab. You need new shells to help you house your new superpowers. You need to open that door and check out some new shells. You can always go back to that old shell. I promise.

If you are happy just coasting, then don’t stop, but if you aren’t happy then what are you doing about it?

What are you learning that helps you find a bigger shell with a better view?

Nathan Hangen and I created a new program that focuses on helping creative people bust out of their shells and unleash their superpowers. Click here to find out more. This is for you, if you’re tired of that same old shell, and you want to create a life and business where you can unleash your superpowers.

* I have some quality guest posts out there and I need to create a post dedicated to spreading the link love, but one of my favorites is on Jonathan Fields blog. It’s called Stop Resisting and Start Creating. Leave a comment and join in on the conversation. Thanks.

If you enjoyed this post then you will probably like these too:

> What Would You do Differently in Your Career?

> How to Discover Your Superpowers

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Editor’s note: This is a guest post from Tim Handorf of Best Colleges Online.

Have you ever found yourself facing an unfamiliar situation that seems impossible to resolve?

Have you ever felt as though your previous experiences and current skills haven’t sufficiently prepared you for this newest task?

I ask because I recently faced my toughest challenge yet, and I want to share with you what I did to persevere.

Last May, I lost my job. I was teaching literature at a university when I learned that they could not renew my contract due to budget restrictions. I had earned a PhD in Literature, had devoted myself to sharing my passion with others, and suddenly I could no longer pursue my dream.

I worried about my teaching prospects. I had moved to a city to be near my family, and I didn’t want to leave them again, so the chances of relocating were unlikely. The economic downturn had hit education hard, and nearby universities and high schools had no openings. I realized that my specialized skill-set, which made me a great candidate for a teaching job, hurt me as I looked for a new career. So here’s what I did to overcome my lack of confidence. Hopefully my process can help you too.

Find Support

I turned to my support network: my family, my friends, and my colleagues. If I wanted to find a job, I would have ask for help. I relied on a friend’s human resources knowledge for resume and cover letter tips. I asked my teaching colleagues to be references. I vented to them on my bad days.

In stressful times, you must lean on those closest to you for support, whether you’re getting ready for a big presentation or setting out on your own business venture.

Apply your Skill-Set

I had to make potential employers see me as a valuable asset to their organization.  I made a list of my skills and experiences and brainstormed possible applications. For example, I taught many college students, so this translated into an ability to communicate well and collaborate with others. Because I graded papers, I had a strong understanding of the writing process and could apply it to different contexts. I soon created a skill set that made me an ideal writer for a communications company. I only lacked professional experience.

Try to list some ways your own skills and experiences apply to new situations. You might have to think creatively in order to match them up, but you might surprise yourself with how capable you really are!

Set Reasonable Goals

I came up with a list of goals I had to accomplish in order to find a job.  I tutored part-time, in order to maintain my employment status. I decided to start blogging in order to create some writing samples that I could show to employers. I sought freelance work, which gave me practice at writing projects on a deadline.

When you have a large goal for yourself, you can sometimes ease the stress by breaking your process into steps. Each step has a goal that is easier to attain.

Develop a Routine

In the mornings, I searched for jobs, writing down anything that looked good. Mid-mornings, I tutored for a couple hours, came home, ate lunch, and then began writing my applications and working on freelance projects. By the end of each week, I had sent out five applications. Even though I didn’t have a job, I felt like I was working hard.

You can use a routine to help keep your mind busy, to make yourself feel productive, and to get useful practice for when crunch time finally rolls around.

Never Stop Dreaming

My hard work paid off. Four months later, I was offered a position as a content writer for an internet company, and my freelance business is increasing. Despite my new career, I will always dream of being a tenured professor. While I am committed to my new job, I consider it another step along the way to realizing my dream.

In my opinion, this is the most important step: never stop believing that you will one day achieve your goals, regardless of what those goals are or how difficult the process becomes.

Bio: This guest post is contributed by Tim Handorf, who writes on the topics of online colleges.

* Follow Work Happy Now on Twitter. Join over 3,600 people who get happiness tips, productivity tips, and thought provoking quotes. @workhappynow

* The Dumb Little Man blog posted a thoughtful piece on timeless happiness techniques. It’s a must read for personal development beginners.

If you enjoyed this post then you will probably like these too:

> You Need Mind Numbing Work

> 7 Skills You Need to Develop a Career that You Love

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Are you happy with your career?

Most people are unhappy with their careers. The research proves that people need to find work that makes them happy.

You can’t rely on anyone else to make you happy.

The question is, “Why don’t the unhappy people find more satisfying work?”

I believe it’s fear.

I know it’s fear.

One more time from the mountain tops – Fear!

Most people would rather complain about their current crappy job instead of finding work that will make them happier. Your career alone isn’t going to be the magic happy pill. Your career is just a part of the whole system.

You may be unhappy in your current position and finding a new job will make you happy for a few months until you fall back into the same old habits. You usually fall back into these old habits because you are afraid of something – either the work, the people, or yourself.

The only way you are going to break these habits is by finding the core of the problem.

You have to walk up to your fear and have an honest conversation.

I like to call my fear my arch nemesis. It’s that little voice inside my head that says I’m not good enough. I actually gave him a name: Dr. Oatzel. By giving that voice a name, it became more tangible, as if I could go up to him and say, “Why do you want to wreck my happiness?”

Defining Your Career

Your career is dependent on how you embrace change. Within change is a big fat fear sausage. This fear, if you let it, will dictate your actions. If you keep taking the safe route you’ll end up with indigestion that never goes away.

Believe me, I’ve been there.

I’ve stayed at safe jobs to keep adding to my 401k, but I felt miserable the whole time. I was stressed out and hating my life.

It wasn’t until I created goals to help me launch my own business that I began to lead from my heart instead of my fear.

Career Bliss

The career that you are developing right now is either setting you up for happiness or sadness. If you are doing work you hate, you are creating a crappy existence. When you do work that engages your heart and mind you don’t worry about what you are possibly doing wrong. You focus on what you are doing right.

You must create a career that’s going to excite you to your core.

If you are just going through the motions, you are living to exist instead of thrive. I hate to see this. I want to see everyone using their superpowers so they can do great work

Fear to Fuel

Nathan Hangen and I created a product called Fear to Fuel – Stop Resisting and Start Creating. It was designed to help two different types of people.

Who this e-course is for

1. People who want to start a small business, but don’t know how to overcome the fear.

2. Small business owners who want to overcome their fear, so they can get unstuck and take their business to the next level.

Nathan and I are both familiar with procrastination that can exist in both of these situations. We’ve worked hard to engage these emotions and use them to our advantage. We know you can do the same thing.

This course is for the creative types. It’s for the people who want to share their writing with the world and actually make some money from it. It’s also for those artists who don’t think that they can make a living from their art. And lastly for people who procrastinate on doing work they love because it’s easier to do work they aren’t passionate about.

This course isn’t for everyone. We know that.

Who this e-course isn’t for:

If you are happy working for someone else then this e-course isn’t for you. Not everyone wants to go through the hassle of developing a business. Don’t worry, I’m creating an e-course for you too. You just have to be patient.

Your Fear

The fear that drives your procrastination is holding you back. If you are tired of letting your arch nemesis control your life, then the Fear to Fuel course is something you should seriously consider.

100% Guarantee

If you don’t love the course we offer a 100% money back guarantee. It’s a win-win. We do ask that you pass the information on to a friend who might be a better fit for the course.

Tired of Being Modest

I know I don’t usually promote my products on this blog. I was afraid of being too pushy. The thing is that I’m so proud of this product that I want everyone to know about it, so I’m not afraid to shout its praises on my blog.

Your Help

Do you someone that hates their job and she needs to take her career in a new direction?

You can be of great help. Let your friend know about this awesome product. You can email them, post on twitter or Facebook, or drag them away from the TV and show them how they could use such an e-course.

Why It’s So Good

Fear to Fuel has over 10 hours of audio, 9 PDF modules, 14 action sheets to go along with each interview and a marketing module. It’s a complete system that will help you launch or build a stronger business.

Comments are Closed

I closed the comments because I would like you to pass this blog post on to 3.5 friends. I know some of you have half a friend.

Download the Free eBook Work Happy the Google Way * Post from: Work Happy Now!

How much does your fear hold you back from doing work you love?

Building a business is not easy. There is crying, yelling, fighting with your arch nemesis, losing your superpowers, gaining them back again, more yelling, wanting to throw in the towel, feeling like you are on top of the world, and knowing everything that you do is worth your efforts.

I’ve been working hard behind the Work Happy Now scenes.

I want to help you with the resistance that you have in starting your own business or taking your business to the next level. Nathan Hangen and I have created an e-course that helps people do just that.

We’re calling it Fear to Fuel – Stop Resisting and Start Creating.

Too often we procrastinate on stuff that really lights our fires because we are afraid of failing at something we truly care about.

Building Interest

Right now we are building interest by releasing 1 part of 9 PDF modules as a free preview. We plan to release an audio interview by a best-selling author by mid-week, and at the end of the week we’ll make the PDF action worksheet ready for you.

Click here to sign up so you can get access to all the free content. After Friday we will be pulling the information down because we want people to buy the e-course.

What’s Inside

The e-course is filled with great stuff to help you leverage your superpowers so you can do more of the stuff you love to do.

Interviews

We interviewed 14 creative experts and asked them tough questions about what they did right and wrong as they built their businesses.

The list is truly amazing. We have Tony Hsieh the CEO of Zappos, Hugh Macleod the amazing cartoonist at Gaping Void, and Gretchen Rubin of The Happiness Project to name a few.

Action Sheets

Each interview comes along with an action sheet that highlights the interview. After you are done listening to the MP3, you can answer some tough questions to help you break through your procrastination.

9 PDF Modules

We created 9 PDF modules that will take you step by step through your fear, teach you how to know where it’s coming from, give you strategies on how to friend your fear, and then help you learn to use your fear to fuel you into action.

Marketing Module

Finally, we created a marketing module. Nathan and I talked about what very few others do – that there is no magic formula for success. It takes a lot of hard work, connecting with the right people and showing up every day. Once people know that they can trust you, that’s when the magic happens. They will tell everyone they know that you are awesome.

Where Porcupines Come In to Play

We picked the topic of fear because it dominates so many of our decisions. Think about the last crappy job you stayed at. Why did you stay?

Because you were afraid of finding a crappier job.

Because you would lose your health insurance.

Because you were afraid of change.

All valid arguments, but so very weak at the same time. Your fear holds you back from doing work that you love.

It’s like hugging a porcupine. You think you can do it gently enough that it won’t prick you. Each time you hug that porcupine, a loose quill jabs you. You pick the porcupine up the next day hoping for better results.

You keep showing up at your job because you’re hoping that one day you will stop being pricked and start being appreciated.

Your fear is holding you back. You aren’t creating something that excites you. Then this course is for you.

Partnership

I partnered with Nathan Hangen because we’ve both struggled with fear and found different ways to use that fear to fuel our businesses. We try something, fail try something else and succeed. Then repeat the things that worked.

We’ve tried so many angles that we know what works best for us. Each failure helps us gain clarity.

Right Now

We are giving away a small piece of the course for free, so we can show you how valuable the whole Fear to Fuel package is. Click here to sign up and you’ll get access to each new part that is released. The first part will be released today. The next 2 parts will be released later this week.

As always if you have any questions, just let me know and I’ll be glad to help.

* No extra links today because that’s how important Fear to Fuel is to me.

Download the Free eBook Work Happy the Google Way * Post from: Work Happy Now!

Editor’s note: This is a guest post from Susan Chambers of SAGE Editing and Research Services.

“The only thing we have to fear is fear itself—nameless, unjustified, unreasoning terror which paralyzes needed effort…”  (Franklin D. Roosevelt, 1^st Inaugural Address, 1933)

Did you know that 12% of Canadians (source: Canadian Mental Health Association) and 18% of American adults ages 18 and older are diagnosed with an anxiety disorder in a given year (source: National Institute of Mental Health)  When you convert the abstract numbers to real people, these findings translate as a distressingly large number of individuals suffering the often debilitating impacts of fear and anxiety; health concerns, a sense of being overwhelmed and helpless, an inability to take action or make changes, and a reduced quality of life.  My guess is that it was in fact the side effects of overpowering fear, the “…nameless, unjustified, unreasoning terror which paralyzes needed effort…” rather than the emotion of fear itself that concerned Roosevelt, back in 1933.

According to an article in Psychology Today by Gordon Livingston (2009), a psychiatrist, the inaction that stems from excessive, irrational fears or fear-based thinking often shows up as a decision to live life from a “safe” position and not take risks, even if that means forsaking opportunities that might provide greater joy and expansiveness to one’s life.  But what are these fears—or perhaps more accurately, anxieties—that keep so many of us immobilized to some degree or another?  How are they triggered? And how do we overcome our fears or at least control them so they don’t take over and imprison our spirits and minds, leaving us depressed and further discouraged (a loss of heart)? Let’s start with human nature and the nature of fear.

Fear, what is it good for?

Fear is defined as the emotional response to an actual or perceived threat of immediate or imminent danger or pain.  The capacity to experience fear is part of human nature that has been hard-wired into us.  From an evolutionary perspective, fear served a valuable purpose in assuring our survival as a species.  When confronted with a threat to our survival, we did what was needed to avert or avoid the danger; we either ran (flight) or defended ourselves (fight) if there was a chance of overcoming our attacker. When it’s functioning normally, our friend fear serves us well when it comes to ensuring our continued survival.  An appropriate “dose” of fear stops most of us from taking fool-hardy chances that would endanger ourselves or others.  Used constructively, a little bit of fear or caution can help us to assess and manage any risks before going into a situation we’re not sure about.  (It’s called a calculated risk for good reason.) A sense of wariness or our good old “gut feelings” can give us a heads up about an impending threat or problem so we have time to either avert or minimize a potentially challenging situation—if we’re tuned into that quiet little voice and treat it with respect.

Where our memory recall of emotions is concerned, our brains don’t bother with linear time, nor do they distinguish between real and imaginary events.  This means we can endlessly replay past incidents that scared us and elicit the exact same feelings and physiological response two or twenty years later if we do not find a healthy way to process or neutralize the emotional charge attached to the episode. It means we can also take those same memories and start generalizing them to similar or future situations, with the unhappy result that we become increasingly fearful and avoid events, people or activities we perceive as threatening to our emotional well-being.

It turns out that fear and anxiety can also be learned and passed on to future generations.  According to Livingston (2009), children who grow up with parents who show a lot of anxiety or apprehensiveness, or who convey an exaggerated sense of the world as a dangerous place, are themselves more likely to develop unreasonable fears as they grow up.  T is easy to see how quickly successive generations within a family could experience generalized anxieties and fears but might not make the link as to how they came to be more anxious than their peers.  Yet knowing and understanding this information could potentially liberate any number of individuals from resigning themselves to a narrow life constrained by fear.

Livingston states that an overly fearful view of the world is also fueled in large measure by our media and how 24 hour news shows report both local and global events, and he points specifically to the emotional impact of news stories which “seem designed more to alarm than inform.”  The overall effect is that our news media seem to be infecting our society with anxiety and conditioning us to accept fear, and I would add helplessness, as normal emotional states.  We have, in essence, become a culture of fear—one in which, Livingston points out, we scare ourselves silly over phantom worries rather than using those fears to galvanize us into facing and resolving the real threats to our well-being.

If we can’t be fearless, we can always be courageous

We tend to equate bravery and courage with being fearless, but this is both unhelpful and inaccurate.  It’s unhelpful because it asks us to deny part of our emotional make-up and hardwiring, and achieve something that is not possible or even advisable.  It is an incorrect equation.  The very individuals we look to as exemplary role models of bravery or courage openly admit that they were not free of fear when they faced grave threats.  They simply kept going with their plan of action, in spite of feeling scared, because they were generally resolute in their decisions, knew the risks attached to what they were doing and in many cases (e.g., Mahatma Gandhi and Nelson Mandela) believed that their actions served a larger cause for a greater good.  Here’s what General George S. Patton had to say about equating bravery with a lack of fear: “If we take the generally accepted definition of bravery as a quality which knows no fear, I have never seen a brave man.  All men are frightened.  The more intelligent they are, the more they are frightened.”  Both Nelson Mandela and Mark Twain also observed that courage is about mastering or resisting fear, not the absence of fear.

But not all philosophers agree with the idea that we need to conquer or resist our fear.  According to J. Krishnamurti,

What is needed, rather than running away or controlling or suppressing

or any other resistance, is understanding fear; that means watch it, learn

about it, come directly into contact with it. We are to learn about fear, not

how to escape from it.”

Krishnamurti’s advice seems both counter-productive and counter-intuitive at first glance, yet it makes a lot of sense on further reflection.  What happens when we try to run away from something?  It usually follows us.  What happens if we try to resist or control something by force?  We exhaust ourselves or create conflict when we go into control mode.

We can decide that it’s okay to have fear—after all it is a part of the human condition—it doesn’t mean we have to define ourselves by our fear.  Who knows, maybe if we choose to just let our fear be and have compassion for it rather than revile it, if we sit with it, experience it, and learn from it, it may just lessen its hold on us more gracefully than if we struggle to conquer or vanquish our fears.  In any case, sitting quietly, observing and learning causes us considerably less suffering than the energy required for fight or flight and perhaps we will learn something valuable in the process.

In the meantime, I’ll leave you with five strategies and short quotes for working with and through fear.  I’ve used these strategies at various times in my life and found them to be incredibly helpful.  May they inspire and encourage you to find the courage within yourself.

Five strategies for working with and through fear

1.  “Let the fear of a danger be a spur to prevent it; [s]he that fears not, gives the advantage to danger.” (Benjamin Disraeli)

Are you feeling wary about a situation or an individual that you interact with?  Or do you have a vague sense that something has changed ever so slightly, but not in a good way? Honour the little tugs of fear and the subtle perceptions you’re receiving.  Listen to them and what they say they’re based on.  Thank them for the heads up, figure out your plan to prevent or minimize the danger you’ve been warned of and proceed with appropriate caution. Talk them through with a trusted confidant or two; don’t dismiss your feelings just because others are maybe not as sensitive to subtle shifts, but consider their input as helpful information or facts that add to a balanced picture before you make a decision. Be observant to the subtleties in your interactions and your life and learn to appreciate your built in early warning system.  It’s there for a reason.

2.  “Listen to what you know instead of what you fear.” (Richard Bach)

If the fears are being driven by self-doubts about your abilities to succeed in realizing a dearly held dream (starting a business, expressing your creativity) and yet you know objectively that you have the skills or talent to follow through, talk to your doubts or self criticisms, ask them what purpose they think they are serving by holding you back through the use of fear.  If they can’t tell you anything helpful, ignore them and find another place within yourself that supports you, reminds you of your competencies, and encourages you to persist in your dreams.

3.  “The media… bear some responsibility for stoking our worry. …many stories seem designed more to alarm than inform.”(Gordon Livingston, 2009)

If you find your fears are being shaped by mass media and the news, go on a news fast (Yes, that means online sources of news, too.).  Use the time to learn or relearn how to think critically and independently.  Learning to ask tough questions about the information we read or hear will strengthen your intellectual and emotional immunity to being manipulated, getting caught up in group-think or getting swept up by mass media produced moral panics.

4.  “There are very few monsters who warrant the fear we have of them (Andre Gide)

Do your fears and anxieties feel like they are monster sized and just as scary? Yes? We often give our fears far too much power by perceiving them to be much bigger than they really are, so shrink them down to size.  Draw your fears on a piece of paper, but keep them on the small side, and have fun making your fears seem as ridiculous and non-threatening as possible in your drawing.  Draw yourself standing tall—much taller than your fears—confident and empowered.  Keep the piece of paper where you can see it to remind you that you are bigger than your fears.

5.  “When I hear music, I fear no danger. I am invulnerable….” (Henry David Thoreau)

Make up a chant or song and sing it when you start feeling afraid.  Use the song to en-courage you—to awaken the courage that does exist within you.  I personally enjoy listening to Deva Premal’s version of a Sanskrit mantra for surrendering fear, but go with whatever works best for your spiritual path, appeals to you and fills you with inner strength and calm.

Sue Chambers writes about empowering the clarity of your message, social issues and the environment at sdc-sage-editing.com/sdc-sagewit.  If you enjoyed this article, you may also like to subscribe to her blog.

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* Kelly Parkinson wrote an awesome post about the importance of making your people feel special. If you don’t make your people feel loved they won’t come back. She uses the Ponderosa restaurant chain as an example. I used to love going to Ponderosa for the all you can eat ice cream. Where are they now?

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