What’s keeping you from your dream?
As much as we want to say we’re not afraid, the truth is that we are. We might tell ourselves our fears are silly or that we shouldn’t be afraid, but we’re still paralyzed by those fears. It happens – whether we want it to or not.
In many ways fear is a good thing. Fear of getting burned keeps us from picking up hot items; fear of getting hurt prevents us from climbing things we can’t handle. Fear keeps us safe. It protects us from harm. Fear that holds us back from our dreams isn’t good, yet it stops us dead in our tracks and won’t let us go any further.
I think the best way to deal with fear is to identify exactly what you’re afraid of. Too often we don’t even know what it is that’s stopping us – it’s just the “great unknown.” Pay close attention to what scares you.
Better the devil you do know than the devil you don’t
Once you’ve identified what it is that you’re scared of, you’ll be able to attack it head on. When it’s just this nebulous cloud of “fear” you have no way to deal with it or try to overcome it. It’s overwhelming and unknown and scary.
Identify your fear, name it, then conquer it.
Click here to download my free ebook, Conquer Your Fears So You Can Conquer the World
Nancy Sathre-Vogel is mom to Family on Bikes, a family of four who recently rode their bikes 17,000 miles from Alaska to Argentina. She blogs about lessons learned from their journey at www.familyonbikes.org
May 3rd, 2012 at 8:27 am
Visions of cold, hunger and disease seem logical to consider but it’s all too easy to build them up into actual glimpses of a real event instead of a nervous daydream. Our worries and concerns eventually give themselves an almost physical substance that we must guard against lest they creep up in the dark. An initially innocent doubt is magnified into a wall of fear and so we seek a guarantee of well-being before venturing out.