Fear is inevitable, yet so many people let it run the show in their lives. I used to let it completely consume me.
I remember being afraid of even the littlest things. I was told I was afraid of touching grass as an infant, speaking up in class, or going on school field trips.
As I grew older, my fear only became worse. I was afraid of moving on campus and away from my parents my freshman year of college, and I spent many years as a teacher with debilitating anxiety about what my principals would say about my teaching.
My fear stemmed from not feeling like a good enough teacher. In 2014, I finally hit a wall and knew I couldn’t live this way anymore. It was robbing me of my joy and enjoying each day.
I share this with you because I know how limiting it can be when fear has a strong hold on our actions, emotions, and thoughts.
I’m not here to paint the picture that you can eliminate fear from your life because you can’t. However, you can learn to live with it as well as learn from it.
Fear is just a signal you need to pay attention to, but you don’t need to let it take control of your life.
It’s surprising how much our thoughts can make it seem like the situation causing the fear is a life or death situation that we are facing – even when it clearly isn’t.
Unfortunately, many of us let our fear stop us from fully showing up as the fullest expression of who we are. We prevent ourselves from going after what we truly want in life.
So let me ask you this:
“Do you experience anxiety and fear regularly?”
“What might be causing this fear?”
“Is it holding you back from what your heart desires?”
Because the thing is, you can choose to handle fear in 1 of 2 ways:
Forget everything and run.
Face everything and rise.
Do you pick 1 or 2?
Ultimately, you have a choice. You can either let the fear run your life, or you can choose to make a change, and rise above it.
If you’re more likely to forget everything and run, listen up!
If you’re facing fear, you’re not alone. Fear and lack of confidence is a recurring theme with my clients, and the reason why they haven’t achieved their career goals and desires.
However, when I began working with my first life coach back in 2015, I learned ways to combat my fear and increase confidence in myself and my teaching abilities. I am confident that you can too.
Recently, I applied for an opportunity to be an expert life coach in a group membership for teachers on Facebook who want to transition out of teaching. I was asked to interview for this opportunity. Many people get nervous during interviews, but surprisingly I’m not one. I love interviews. I joke that if interviewing was a career, I would do it in a heartbeat. All jokes aside, I ended up getting selected for the opportunity.
Amazing right?
Part of this opportunity means I have to do Facebook lives once a month for an hour to speak on a life coaching topic that would support the teachers in the membership program.
Even though I have done numerous Facebook lives and no longer get nervous doing them, fear still kicked in. Remember, fear is inevitable. The situation isn’t the problem, but it’s how we choose to handle it that can be the problem or how we rise above.
Initially I was getting the same old stories creeping in:
“Would I be good enough?”
“Would these teachers want to work with me as their life coach?”
“What if I don’t speak well?”
However, after calming myself down, I realized this was a fantastic opportunity, and they wouldn’t have picked me if they didn’t know I was a great fit. So, I will show up with confidence and give it my all. That’s all we can do.
I’m here to tell you, not to let fear, anxiety, and your lack of confidence rob you from going for your dreams. If you want a change in your career or life, go for it. Take small action steps to make your dream a reality because by doing so you open doors to a wide variety of possibilities.
So, I’m leaving you with this:
What would you do if fear no longer played a part in your life?
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