There seems to be a lot of fear going around these days. Fear of getting sick, fear of going broke, fear of going broke because you got sick, fear of the unknown and apparently even fear of running out of toilet paper.
All this fear going around is kinda weird since fear isn’t actually real. You can see someone who appears to be scared but you can’t see the fear. You can hear someone scream but you’ve never heard fear make a sound. Fear has no odor, no color and no taste. Show me what fear looks like and I’ll hold up a mirror and show you someone with a vivid imagination.
You’ve never seen fear because fear doesn’t exist.
Dale Carnegie once said the “the only place fear exists is in our minds.” If that were all there was to it then no one would ever be afraid. Unfortunately the mind is very powerful and it frequently convinces us that the unreal is indeed very real.
When your mind convinces you that your fear is real the effects can be devastating. Fear can be and often is fatal to dreams. It paralyzes our thinking and it spreads quickly. Allowed to exist long enough fear will consume all rational thinking. When relational thinking is gone fear can play all kinds of tricks on us. It’s favorite trick seems to be making us believe the possible is actually impossible.
The good news is that there is an antidote for fear. It’s called action. Almost any action will do but nothing beats carefully considered, planned out action.
That is one reason I have so many plans. Plans in case I lose my income. Plans in case I get sick and can’t work. Plans for things out of my control. Yes, I understand that I can’t control things out of my control but I can certainly have a plan for how I will respond to them. So can you!
I have plans so when fear attempts to overtake me I don’t have to think…I just have to take whatever actions my plan says to take. That fake sensation of fear gets swamped by action.
Having a plan before fear attempts it’s takeover is best but it’s not essential. But when fear begins to creep in you must act quickly. Just do something. Do one thing that you know is right. Then do another, a couple of quick actions will buy you a bit of time to do some planning. Be sure that your plan includes lots of action steps because every action you take will weaken fear’s ability to hold you back.
As powerful as fear can feel at times the reality is that fear has only the power that you allow it to have. The secret to eliminating fear in your life is to believe in yourself more than you believe in fear.
Fear is an illusion that is easily exposed by logical thoughts and actions. YOU CAN beat it. You can outthink it. You can out hustle it. You can overpower it with a belief in yourself.
The only question is whether or not you believe you can.
So, do you believe?