Let’s Talk About Fear
Today, I want to talk about fear. There is so much fear going on right now with the Coronavirus and different things happening in the political world and in the markets and in our communities. It seems like everything around us is creating this horrible feeling of anxiety and fear. As most of you guys know, my little guy has generalized anxiety disorder. He’s really struggling at school right now because he goes onto these group chats where it’s all everyone talks about. He ends up wandering in his head surrounded by anxiety and fear.
Lately, I’ve been seeing that in one way, shape or form, it’s kind of happening to all of us. We’re all wandering around a little bit in our heads, imagining these terrible situations when we read, hear or see something in the news. What if that happens to me? What if I lose my job? What if I can’t go to work? The minute we start feeling these fears we start losing the ability to function at our normal rates.
There are people that I know who have lost business because things get canceled, contracts get canceled, and that’s tough. But there are two things I would like to suggest before you end up in a tailspin of despair. One suggestion is personal, because I’ve been around anxiety for about 30 years and it’s a strategy that actually really helps. The other is more business orientated. So the first thing is how to stop an anxious death cycle. Anxiety is actually under the same umbrella as OCD. Anxieties are like a looping thought, right? What if I get sick? What if I get sick? What if I get sick?
Looping thoughts are scary. You need to counteract that by looping positive thoughts. Maybe you need to repeatedly tell yourself you are healthy. As you think that thought, it counteracts the loop, slows it down and allows it to close and this might be difficult. So here’s the strategy for those who find that really difficult because the anxious voice in our head can be really, really loud.
Grab a sticky note, write a positive phrase or word on that sticky note and read it over and over and over and over. When you tell your brain this, you are feeding it the right information. You’re feeding it how you want it to think. This will allow for the loop to close.
The second thing I’d like to suggest to you is regarding your business. A lot of people that I talk to right now are looking at their plans for 2020. They are setting income goals and then they are spending the entire year super stressed out about whether or not they’re going to hit that goal. Instead, I want you to focus on activity goals. What can you control? In this world where everything seems out of control, focus on what is immediately within your control. What actions can you take right now that, if you do consistently, you can steer your business in the right direction?
Don’t let someone else’s fear become your own. Ask yourself, is this information going to make me more or less anxious? Is it something that I need to take on because I need to modify what I’m doing? For example, washing our hands more often is a great bit of information to take on and implement into your life.
I really hope that you have found this to be helpful. I do help people with fear a lot. I feel like half my book (which is on Amazon and coming soon to Indigo!) talks about self-sabotage.
One of the ways we sabotage ourselves is by allowing our fears to take over and run our lives and own the day and own our minds. You have to make a decision. You have to make a choice. Is this something that you’re going to allow happen to you or are you going to try to come against it? There are people who struggle more with anxiety than others, I appreciate everyone will have a different course to happiness. If you want to reach out to me, please do. If you’re struggling with fear and you don’t want to comment publicly, by all means, please send me a direct message. I would be happy to hop on the phone with you, give you a few more strategies.
Remain as anxiety-free as you possibly can. Focus on the things you can control. If you do find yourself looping into unhealthy thoughts, you now know how to fix it. It works every single time. Take care.