What are your greatest fears?
They most likely come from three places the mind latches on to:
1. The past, commonly guilt.
2. The future, commonly anxiety.
3. The present moment, which is significantly less likely.
We have between sixty to eighty thousand thoughts a day and we talk to ourselves ten thousand times a day, radio me is playing all day and all night in our
heads.
These thoughts generally focus on three areas:
1. Work-life
2. Homelife
3. Myself (me) (I)
We are obsessed with protecting ourselves and re-producing. For example, have you ever been angry when you are hungry? That’s an exaggerated fear of starving. That’s you saying I am scared something bad is going to happen and I don’t deserve this. We never stop our mental chatter as a way to protect ourselves.
Everything that has happened to us leaves imprints like crumbs on our mind and we find it hard to forget past events particularly unpleasant memories. For example, If you fall off a bike going around a corner as a child, that incident would leave an imprint, and if you were to go past it again on a bike you would most likely go slow out of fear and to protect yourself. However, someone else who has not experienced the same event as you prior would not slow down as they feel less fear.
Largely our constant chatter and thoughts are not helpful, recent studies believe up to 80% of our thoughts can be negative.
So how can we change this?
Susan Jeffers author of the book ‘Feel fear and do it anyway’ wrote: “Our greatest fear is we can't handle what is about to come” and the biggest thing we can do to change this is to say
“I have got this”
Let us go deeper, what is the way to overcome fears?
If you can change your thoughts which change your words this will change your actions
It's all about how you respond. Jack Canfield introduced a simple sum in the book ‘Success principles’ E plus R equals O.
E, Events, will always happen, like traffic jams. These things frustrate us R, Respond, how you respond is what counts as that will result in the O, Outcome, which is what will be remembered.
Many studies conclude you can only be angry for seven seconds after that you are
choosing to be. So, in the example above ‘whilst in traffic’ instead of getting angry realise it is ok I can call a friend, listen to music, relax, this is how I will respond, and the outcome will not include fear.
If worry kicks in and that dreaded “What if I am going to be late? What if I get sacked?
Or what if the plane will take off an hour early? Change the ‘What if’ to ‘So what’ this approach is described well by Brain McDonagh in the book ‘Dare response’ as he explains this method defuses anxiety and our overreactions to a situation. He would encourage you to think … so what everyone is late now and again it is normal.
For me, we have to control the controllable and that’s all about being in the moment, playing to our strengths as we can't change gravity so let’s stop trying, we can't change it from raining so let’s stop worrying, but we can take an umbrella and we don’t get wet.
So, what are the five things we can do to change our life and reduce anxiety?
I have tried and tested the below activities for twelve months as a collective and in the case of some of the techniques I have practiced them for over twenty years and I am convinced practicing these for fifteen minutes in a morning can transform your life.
1. Meditation for five minutes.
As the Buddhist master, Geshe Kelsang Gyatso wrote “Meditation is a mind that contemplates on a virtuous object and is the real cause of mental peace”. The Benefits are reduced stress and worry with increased peace of mind. A simple practice of sitting still and watching your breath not being distracted and following every thought.
2. Affirmation three minutes.
This practice is one of the most powerful ways to change the way you think about yourself and change your self-talk. Simply repeating a positive sentence in your mind twenty-one times, an example could be: ‘I am enough’
3. Visualisations for three minutes.
All top athletes do this for example sprinters at the start of a race staring down the track, boxers before a fight, golfers before a put. Whatever you conceive and believe you can achieve. Simply join the dots that you want to connect in your day.
4. Gratitude for three minutes.
It is scientifically proven that if you cannot feel anything but joy if you are in a state of gratitude. For me, joy is better than happiness as happiness is reliant on an outcome, or an objective is achieved. In this exercise simply think of all the things in your life you are grateful for.
5. Today’s priorities for one minute.
To be clear on your day your thinking, stop overwhelm and procrastination, simply write down the three big things you want to achieve today. The benefits of this exercise: You will get them done quicker, you will be less distracted, and you will feel a sense of achievement at the end of the day.
In closing, this practice is simple however I would recommend trying one of the five activities for three weeks to become comfortable, then try another in fifteen weeks you could be benefiting from them all. That’s only one hundred and five days we have that time left in 2021. With this, you could become your best again, fearless and confident in 2022.
Thank you for reading this blog.
My name is Mark I am an Anxiety coach. I offer video courses, group coaching, and bespoke 121 sessions over zoom on the above content. For more information visit: