Empower Your Decision-Making by Overcoming Fear
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Discover how to liberate yourself from making fear-based choices in your life. Learn to identify hidden drivers, confront fear directly, and navigate challenging choices wisely.
Difficult decisions are part of life.
Whether it's ending a long-standing relationship that’s no longer working, deciding to venture into an exciting but high-risk opportunity, or letting go of a beloved project that's not yielding the results you'd hoped for...we all face myriad challenges regularly.
In our unique personal journeys, it’s crucial to become aware of and liberate ourselves from any underlying fear that may impact our ability to make clear, wise choices. Here's how.
The Hidden Forces Impacting Our Life Choices
It's essential to understand where we’re really coming from when making decisions. How can we notice and free ourselves from unhelpful forces within us that are driving our choices?
Are we objectively responding to each aspect of a situation, seeing with crystal clarity?
Or are we too entangled in the situation, allowing it to distort our ability to see clearly and choose the best course of action?
How Fear Plays into Our Choices
Critical decision points can trigger fear, and each of us has our own set of things we tend to fear in life. Some of us may fear that we’re not good enough. Others may fear that a decision could lead to loss – of financial security, relationships, status, etc.
Experiencing fear is not the problem. The problem lies in not realizing that our decisions are being driven by fear, leading it to distort and negatively impact our decision-making process. The more consequential the situation, the greater the potential fallout from being unknowingly driven by fear.
The Consequences of Ignoring Fear
No one enjoys experiencing fear-based thoughts and feelings, so we often try to suppress them. This strategy doesn’t work well because any unresolved fear-based thoughts and feelings continue to impact us. Buried, they subtly influence our choices without our noticing, skewing our perspectives.
This can lead to moments of confusion about why we're saying or doing certain things.
The 'At Any Cost' Dilemma
Consider this: a fear-based thought like, “I’m afraid I could lose my security,” originates from a part of us that's trying to protect us from that loss.
If we're driven to ensure our safety, that part of us will always be on alert for any threat. Worse, our fear will attempt to fulfill its mission at all costs.
It’s the “at any cost” part that usually gets us into trouble. like in a situation where we're evaluating a new opportunity with great potential but some risk. The ignored and buried fear will try to diminish the threat by distorting our perception of the opportunity — emphasizing the risk to prevent us from taking a leap.
This fear within us won’t care about the potential gains because its mission is to keep us safe at all costs.
An example of this could occur in a situation where we’d like to be in a relationship with someone wonderful. We meet someone who seems great, but the buried fear magnifies the possibility that the relationship may not work out, which would be painful.
The fear could cause us to run away from the budding relationship, even if that person has many of the qualities we’d love in a partner. Fear of rejection, fear of pain, fear of being exposed, it could be any fear.
Becoming Aware and Turing Toward Our Fears
The key is for us to be aware of the types of situations that tend to generate fear for us so that we can address the fear directly instead of letting it distort our perspectives and skew our decisions.
Aware people acknowledge the presence of fear and endeavor to turn toward it, tolerating the discomfort that comes with it. When we stop trying to avoid it, we position ourselves to address the fear directly. Facing our fears — even in the toughest situations — allows us to see more clearly and to act wisely. To make far better choices.
Facing Irrational Fears to Make Wiser Choices
And what we'll discover is that most of the fear we experience is generated by some degree of irrational thinking. These fear-based thoughts will not stand up once we take a discerning look at them.
When we see through the illusions of these thoughts and beliefs, our capacity to assess and make even major life decisions remains unclouded.
Adopting a New Approach: 'See the Fear and Deal with It'... Now
There's wisdom in the idea of "feel the fear and do it anyway." I prefer "see the fear and deal with it so it doesn’t interfere with making wise choices."
It's crucially important to become aware of and address any fear that appears to be driving us. Why? Because in doing so we enhance our chances of having the clarity and presence of mind to make wise decisions, regardless of how challenging any situation may be.
Would you like to be more present, feel more alive and connected, with a greater sense of inner peace?
Do you need to bring some hidden fears to light? Together, we can examine your most challenging situations and ensure that the conscious individual you are is confidently driving your life's journey. It's my mission to support people in living and leading with greater ease, wisdom, and inner peace. To feel more deeply connected with those around them.
If you'd like to tap into your deeper insight and practical wisdom to live and lead more consciously, feel free to reach out at bodhi@bodhijeffreys.com to set up a time to connect.
To see what others have to say about the work we do together, please check out the testimonials here. I look forward to connecting.
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