The Solution To Fear: CHOICE

(read last week’s blog first for context)

Choosing to face the fog of fear is one thing.  Acting on that choice is another.  Author John Maxwell provided some clarity on this idea when he said, “You can act your way into feeling long before you can feel your way into action.  If you wait until you feel like doing something, you will likely never accomplish it.”  If fear is an uneasiness caused by the way we are choosing to perceive the world around us, the solution is changing the lens, refocusing on action rather than reaction.  

Easier said than done, right?  That is because it takes a great deal of courage, for the decision to act will always precede a change in feeling.

Friends, the truth is that our thoughts impact our behavior.  Changing our thought life precedes a change in behavior.   According to author Nir Eyal, “Though we often assume our identity is fixed, our self-image is, in fact, flexible and is nothing more than a construct in our minds.  It’s a habit of thought.”   Our “habits of thought” begin to change when we start adjusting what we allow into our minds.  Our input determines our output.  

The term “tunneling” is used by psychologists to describe the phenomenon when people give up solving any problems because they are overwhelmed by all of them.  In the tunnel, there is only forward.  We have all experienced tunneling before.  We get so caught up in spinning all of the proverbial “plates” that eventually one falls and crashes to the ground.  Distracted at the chaos and panic stricken at fear of doing it again, more fall and before long, we find ourselves sweeping up cracked remains of good intentions.

If we want to change the way we act, we must first focus on allowing the way we think to be changed.  That begins with a choice.  Will we choose to only look forward through the tunnel of habituation, or will we stop the cycle of fear by choosing a different path?

To get out of the tunnel, we have to make better choices.  To lift the fog, we have to focus on that which we can control.  And in life we only have control over two things: our attitude and our effort. 

We’ll talk about that next week.

See you soon!