Are your stories based in fear or truth?
I was coaching a woman the other day and she brought up a deeply rooted belief that’s not only holding her back from amazing things coming into her life, but also keeps cycling her back to grief and regret for a loss which she is otherwise at peace with.
When she mentioned the belief, I asked her to pause, and then I challenged the belief. Working together, we discovered so many instances where that belief could be shown to be untrue. And yet, it felt so real to her.
So we dove in and talked more. About the belief. The ways that holding onto that belief were hurting her. And about whether or not that belief was actually true, or was in fact a story her fear was telling her. The conclusion she came to – the story was in fact one her fear was shouting at her.
The science behind fear
First, you are not your fear.
Scientifically, fear is a response by your amygdala to anything which is perceived to be a threat. Your amygdala is the part of your brain often referred to as your “reptile brain”. It’s an ancient part of the brain that evolved as animals made the transition from water to land.¹ During this evolutionary period, there were many new and unknown threats which creatures needed to learn to survive.
The way the amygdala keeps you safe is by sending a fear response throughout your body whenever it encounters (among others) anything: new, different, or similar to something which caused fear in the past.
All of this happens on a subconscious level. You only become aware that the amygdala has been triggered when you start to feel the symptoms of fear (increased heart and respiration rate, sweaty palms, and tightness in your chest or stomach) caused by the increase in adrenaline and other stress hormones released in response to messages from the amygdala. (Read more about that response here.)
Let’s think about your fear like a seatbelt. If you’re driving along and someone rear ends you, that seatbelt can keep you safe and help prevent you from being injured. However, if instead of getting in an accident, you drive along and reach your destination. You open the car door but don’t take off your seatbelt, in that moment it stops being something keeping you safe, and instead becomes something trapping you in the car.
Fear serves a very real purpose. However, fear unexamined can cause us to remain stuck in old ways of thinking and patterns of behavior which no longer serve us.
The energetics of fear
Fear is a shadow emotion. Shadow emotions are called that not because they are innate darker than other emotions. Rather at some point we (individually and as a society) determined these emotions were not desirable and pushed them into the shadows, denying them equal value to our other emotions.
The goal of shadow work is to identify, understand, and fully incorporate our shadows into ourselves. (Shadow work is an incredibly intense and deep level of self-work, if you’re interested in exploring this practice, make sure you’re working with a teacher who can help guide you through the practice.)
Think of your fear as a young child who’s been separated from their parent in a crowded store. Everything feels scary and overwhelming. And they are searching for the one familiar face to run to among all the strange and unknown ones.
If you noticed that frightened child in the store, what would you say or do? Would you scold her for crying? Tell her to get over it, she’s overreacting? Or would you kneel down to her level, smile, use a gentle and kind voice, and reassure her that she would be ok, and you would help keep her safe until she no longer felt afraid?
Finding a better way to communicate with your fear
Now think about how you talk to your fear. When you try to ignore it or tell it to go away, you just cause the fear to talk even louder in an attempt to get you to listen and pay attention. If you let your fear run the show and call the shots, that’s the same as letting your small child dictate how you run your day based on their agenda, not yours.
Let’s go back to the analogy of the scared child. Your fear is trying to keep you safe. Instead of ignoring it or pushing it away. Take a moment to try and comfort it. How would you respond to a crying child? Can you treat your fear the same way?
When we start treating our fear like a small child, letting it know you hear it and that you are both safe, you begin to build a healthy relationship with it. Sometimes our fear just needs to be heard and acknowledged. Sometimes it needs to be reminded you are in charge, not it. And sometimes it actually has an important message for us to hear. The important part is to begin to build a healthy relationship and dialogue with your fear.
Let’s get back to the story
Now that you know a little more about fear, look at some of the stories you’re telling yourself. Take some time to inquire within. Are they in fact true, or are fear (your amygdala or a scared child) trying in their own way to keep you safe.
Can you think of any examples that would demonstrate that this story is not 100% true? Maybe you can come up with dozens of examples where this story is not true. When you find yourself saying – well it might not be true for them, but it is for me. That is a key indicator to start questioning if this is a story fear is using to try to keep you safe.
For years I told myself that I didn’t have what it takes to be self-employed. I saw countless friends and even family members successfully navigate self-employment, but I was sure it wasn’t for me. When I finally dove in and questioned that story, I discovered that it was one told by fear. Fear that I couldn’t or wouldn’t be successful working for myself.
Once I assured fear that I had a plan and I was not about to end up starving or homeless. That I could cover living expenses, the cost of building a business, and health insurance. Only then was I able to take the leap and start NourishNestBreathe. Now one year in, fear occasionally still pops up to remind me that this adventure I’m on can be scary. And so I sit with the fear. I examine the story, looking for the truth. And then I reassure my fear that we’re still safe, that we still have food on the table and a roof over our heads.
What about your stories. When you take the time to examine them, are they keeping you stagnant? Are they holding you in the known instead of letting you grow and learn by leaping into the unknown?
When the story isn’t fear
Just a quick side note. Sometimes the story might be true for you even if you can find hundreds of examples that it’s not true for others. This frequently occurs when your truth runs counter to the societal norm.
I don’t want to have children. I’ve never really wanted to have children. When I was a kid, I only had stuffed animals, no dolls. There was never a moment when I watched a friend with their new baby and though – I want that. I wasn’t worried I would be a bad parent, in fact, I was pretty sure I would be a great parent. But I didn’t want to be a parent.
I can point to hundreds and thousands of people who say having a baby changed their lives in the most wonderful way. That doesn’t mean that it is, or would have been, the right decision for me.
When you find that your story runs counter to the societal norm or to others expectations, that’s a good sign that the story might in fact be your own personal truth, and have nothing to do with fear.
Rewriting your sankulpa
Stories we tell ourselves over and over become ruts in the brain. In Sanskrit, these ruts or grooves are called sankulpa. Just like the ruts on a road where cars tend to fall into these tracks and ride along in them rather than blazing a new trail, our brains do the same thing. It’s easier to stay in the tracks of the old story than blazing the trail to a new one.
When you discover that the story you’ve been telling yourself is one based in fear and not reality, you need to not only fill in the old ruts carved by this story, but also create new grooves with a new story that better reflects the truth.
To do this, every time you find yourself repeating the old story, stop, take a deep breath, and instead repeat the new story. Boil your new story down to a sentence or two. Use it as an affirmation you repeat to yourself first thing in the morning and right before you go to sleep. Focus on the new story during meditation and pranayama (breathwork practice), repeating your affirmation or visualizing the new story becoming a reality.
And give yourself grace when the old story continues to resurface. If you find yourself becoming critical about the speed at which you’re rewriting your story, check out this post on how to respond to the mean girl in your head. Especially when you’ve been telling yourself a story for a long time, it will take some time to rewrite it in your brain. Think of moving all the grains of sand from one sandcastle to another using only a teaspoon. It takes time!
As you rewrite one story, you may notice others begin to arise for consideration. Continue at your own pace, knowing that this is the work of a lifetime, not a few hours, days, weeks, or even months.
[…] I’ve covered fear several times before, and you can read more about the impact fear has on your life here. […]
[…] If all you hear is – “you can’t do it” or “that’s just not possible”, it’ll be a thousand times harder to believe you can. (If you can’t get past the fears you have heard in the past, check out this post.) […]