Fear. It can paralyze you. Those horrible dreams, where you want/need to scream out for help, your mouth opens, but nothing comes out? Only to eventually and gratefully awaken from the nightmare, intact and safe.
Or it can mobilize you to fight or flee. Ever been cut off while driving, and you get a sharp tingle as you quickly react and slam on the brakes? Or a child runs into the street after a wayward ball? Suddenly you have superwoman speed. Even watching a frightening scene in a movie, or reading it in a book, can elicit a physical response. Your shoulders may tense, your heart may race, your breathing becomes quick and shallow. We are such responsive creatures, aren’t we? This is our body getting us ready to protect us, either by fighting, fleeing, or freezing.
The Sympathetic Nervous System
It is an intricate system and works beautifully, the sympathetic nervous system. Any threat and our body responds such to give us a burst of energy, strength and speed in our limbs, dilate our pupils, and open our lungs. Of course, other functions then take a back seat. Like digestion, like the immune system, like libido, and our metabolism and growth. Also very important, but in a short-term emergency, they can wait, right?
As you might guess, these stressful situations aren’t the only ones that activate the SNS (sympathetic nervous system), and one of our biggest problems in today’s day and age is when we become chronically stressed, because to put it mildly, everything gets screwy!
The stress response and the toll it takes on our health is seen in a myriad of symptoms and conditions, and I’m certain you are all familiar with some of the different expressions of stress on your health.
The Diminishing Effects of Fear
But today, I want to focus on a small aspect of stress and that is of fear. As I mentioned in the beginning of this article, fear most often takes away our ability to act. There are some of us that aggressively respond to fear. Striking out in anger, impulsively cursing at others, and losing our tempers. However, underneath of that, and for most of us, fear has a diminishing effect. We get smaller and less active in the face of fear, our muscles contracting, shoulders hunching, and we protectively guard our hearts and our guts.
Many times, that fear is not in response to a physical threat, but rather a mental one.
We still curl up and protect our hearts and our guts.
Our Greatest Fears Relate to Our Deepest Needs
The way I see it, our greatest fears touch on our greatest needs:
- Security (our health, home, finances, core relationships)
- Personal Expression (do we feel seen and heard?)
- Reputation (what do others think of us?)
- Life and Death (fear of death and clinging to life)
It is certainly understandable. When something is important to us, the thought of losing it can trigger our fearful response. However, this fear, especially if not attended to, will snowball and accumulate, gaining momentum and power. It can take over your life.
I recently read Anita Moorjani’s account of her near death experience in her book, “Dying to Be Me: My Journey from Cancer, to Near Death, to True Healing.” She has many lovely lessons embedded in her book, but the biggest takeaway for me was the fact that she felt her buildup of fears in her life not only created her cancer and suffering, but the near death experience and release of her fears was what healed her.
While we will not all have such dramatic experiences as she has had, I think that a honest look at the role that our fears play in our lives will reveal its impact.
The opposite of fear is trust. But is trust a choice? Can we really just decide to trust? Even if I intellectualize the importance of trust, there is no guarantee that I will authentically and actually begin to trust. And who and what am I trusting in? Myself, other people, institutions?
Let’s start with ourselves, as we are at the core of our own universe, and ultimately, the basis for all relationships.
So, how can you build trust in yourself to face your fears?
Building Trust in Yourself
I utilize several techniques and ideas for building trust for myself and for my students. Some are tangible physical actions and practices, while others are about more subtle mind shifts and thought patterns. Here are a few of my techniques:
- Practice grabbing at the low-hanging fruit
- Equanimity in yoga practice
- Practicing generosity
- Step-by-step
- Appreciating the diversity of the world, and your unique contribution to it
- Belief in the divine, in God, in that which is beyond us
Grabbing the Low-Hanging Fruit
“Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgement that something else is more important than fear.”
Ambrose Redmoon
The low-hanging fruit in your life are the little fears. You know, those small decisions that you make to do or not do something because of a somewhat cautious response. Those little fears that seem to build up naturally as we age. Perhaps, not traveling by yourself, as you’ve accustomed yourself to having a partner always. Or, not doing something technical, because you have someone younger or more technically inclined to take care of it. Maybe it’s as simple as not ordering something new off the menu, because you know what you like and why risk a bad meal?
These innocuous decisions are little glimpses of how insidious fear can be. They aren’t full blown fears, but often prompted by our desire for the known, the comfortable, the settled. It is not that we are really “afraid” of the bad meal, but that we have become risk averse.
This low-hanging fruit is ripe for the picking! It doesn’t take too much courage, but in fact, these very small shifts in behavior can have a tremendous impact on our confidence. Take a peak at the fearful fruits hanging in front of your eyes, and see what it feels like to pick one off.
You may realize that it was harder to do than you anticipated…requiring you to pull some courage from your gut and go forth. But each time gets easier, and even if it doesn’t turn out perfectly or as expected, you will most likely find that you are ok.
Because just like our fears gain momentum, so can our confidence in ourselves as we continue to challenge those smaller risks. Our entire experience of ourselves and what we are capable of can be reworked by the conscious decisions to not allow the small fears to diminish us.
“Do one thing every day that scares you.”
Eleanor Roosevelt
Equanimity
The cultivation of equanimity can be found in our practice on the mat in an almost lab-like experiment. We have multiple opportunities from the moment we unroll our mat to bring this quality alive. What exactly is equanimity?
Oxford languages defines this noun as “mental calmness, composure, and evenness of temper, especially in a difficult situation.”
As we encounter a variety of sensations in our yoga practice, we have the opportunity to notice our reactions, mental and physical. We can move slowly enough to observe ourselves, and act judiciously to determine the path ahead. Does a posture elicit fear? What are your body’s reactions? Tension, retraction? Is the fear justified? Can I just linger in this space and breathe for a moment? Am I really in danger?
As you take the time to determine your body and mind’s reactions to a posture, you can move out of your reptilian brain and use your higher functions to determine the response that you want to have.
You will also notice that as you work to practice equanimity, there is also the opposite response to certain other postures…your favorite poses may elicit an eagerness or excitement, that ultimately we also want to balance. Observe the push and pull of your emotions and mental stability as different postures attract or repulse you, and see if you can understand why.
Over time, the practice of this becomes more and more natural, until equanimity flows. Of course, transferring these skills off the mat is another challenge, but that is a chat for another time.
Practicing Generosity
We are not all born generous. Though I believe there are individuals who come by this quality more naturally, most of us need to work at it.
But, like all things, it does get easier with practice.
When we take generous actions, fear drips off of us. It may require setting aside a lot of fear in order to be generous, but once you do, you will enter an expansive state. It is an act of trust to give.
Obviously, you cannot give that which you do not have, but you will be surprised at how releasing a small portion of what you have makes space in your heart and soul. Space for trust. And we all have something to give.
“Be kind whenever possible. It is always possible.”
Dalai Lama
Step-by-Step
Gradual and graduated is key. If fear has a tight hold on you, work in increments. Small steps, gradual progress, with a plan and with support. It’s okay to hang out at a certain step for some time too. Use your breath to help you inhabit each stage, until it feels integrated into who you are. When you are ready, keep moving.
Life is a Diverse Tapestry
Life really is very diverse. Let us appreciate the diversity of the world, which includes a range of opinions, philosophies and ideas. Let us appreciate our unique contribution to the world. Let us also recognize that as humans, we are limited in our ability to know all. We are not homogenous and as such, we will have our fans and our critics. Not everyone is going to agree with us. Not everyone is going to like us. We are not going to like everyone. But we all have an equal measure in this world. We all have value. You have value.
You be you.
As you listen to your own voice, validating your own feelings, your intellect and your journey, do you notice if conflicting opinions or voices cause you to doubt or fear your own truth? Do you feel defensive and oppositional when others challenge you? Or do you cave to the pressure and weight of others influences and opinions?
Can we make space for our own truth to exist alongside that of others? I have to trust my own voice, but also trust that there is room for the diversity of many other voices. Often times, the “other” is scary to us, but by recognizing the inherent value in their existence and opinion, we can release and find trust over fear.
A Higher Power
Belief in the divine, in God, the Creator…I don’t think there is anything, anywhere that is more reassuring than connecting to our spirituality.
We are spiritual beings encased in physicality. Connecting to our essence, our light, while living on this earth is a renewable source of trust and security. My personal spiritual journey has been winding and revealing, supportive and enlightening and it infuses everything that I do. I think that belief in a higher power is the ultimate leap of faith…of trust. While we can build trust in ourselves and in others, the full expansiveness of our reality is ultimately grounded in this. What that means for you is specific to you. But I believe that it is extremely important in the conversation on trust.
Facing My Fears During Pregnancy
I wrote about it in my article on Spring and Birth, but it was during pregnancy where I began to confront some of my greatest fears, those of death and injury in my child or myself. You can read about it in the full article, but I methodically uncovered and addressed these fears, with preparation, with relaxation tools and visualization, and lots of positive examples surrounding me. I also connected deeply to my faith in my own resilience, supported by my personal faith in God. Through this process, I was able to choose trust over fear.
Time and time again, life gives us plenty of opportunities to confront our fears. Whether we like it or not, our approach and the courage we exhibit in this journey has a direct impact on our health and on our happiness. Particularly as we age, if we don’t actively rally against our natural tendencies to avoid risks, we will miss out on life’s greatest joys and pleasures.