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Mojo Monday - Fear is Not a Time to Freeze: It’s a Time to Listen and Show Up · Hardiness with Dr Paul Taylor

• 0:09
  Speaker 1: Everyone, it's Carli Taylor here for this week's Mojo Monday.
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: So if you want to be free of anxiety and
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: fear and negative self talk, you know, all those emotions
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: and thoughts that we spend so much energy trying to
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: get rid of, then really, when you think about it,
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: nothing in your life would matter because the flip side
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: of it, if you want to make those uncomfortable emotions
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: and uncomfortable thoughts disappear, you also have to take away
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: the joy, the love, the excitement, the happy thoughts. Life
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: would become this shade of gray and you would feel numb.
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: It would really be like riding a rollercoaster with no emotion.
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: So the people around you are screaming with fear or
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: screaming with excitement, but you you would feel nothing. You
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: just sit there with his blank look on your face.
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: And that's not living fully. We can't live a life
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: free of emotion, and this is what seems to be
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: the struggle. Our humanness means we feel, and to feel
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: is both amazing and it's also really painful. And emotions
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: rise and fall, light waves, they come, they go up
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: and up and up, they peak, and then they subside.
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: Even an anxiety attack. For an examples like a huge wave.
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: So it builds and builds and builds, and on average
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: it takes around ten minutes, sometimes longer before it begins
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: to ease, but it never sticks around forever, and as
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: unbearable as it can feel at the time, it will
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: never keep climbing. In fact, the more we try and
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: fix it, or fight with it or get rid of it,
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: the bigger the wave can feel. There's a culture that
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: we've developed in the West, and there's very blurred line
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: between what's a normal human response to life's events, to
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: life's circumstances, and what's actually a disorder. And we are
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: offered endless parts that promise relief, but those pasts don't
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: necessarily lead to a happy or meaningful life. So here's
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: a reframe. So let's take fear, for example, and this
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: could be anxiety, sadness, anything, any emotion, any uncomfortable emotion
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: that shows up. Ask yourself, what does this say about
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: what I truly care about? So if you fear being alone,
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: if you fear being lonely, maybe it's because you deeply
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: value love, friendship, and connection. If you feel fear of
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: failing an exam, a job, interview or a project. Maybe
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: it's because you value achievement, or you value doing meaningful
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: work on making a contribution, or maybe it could be
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: around identity and integrity. So fear isn't something to get
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: rid of in these cases, and it's not an emotion
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: we always recognize right away. So often it shows up
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: as anger, frustration, or even avoidance. But underneath fear is
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: a compass pointing towards what matters most. So it's not
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: a stop sign. Maybe it's more like a giveaway sign,
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: a signal to pause, to slow down, to notice, and
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: to ask yourself, what is this pointing me towards? Because
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: without that compass, we can lose our way and end
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: up in even more pain and an avoidance and in inaction,
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: and that doesn't lead anywhere. We need to steer us
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: back to what gives our lives meaning and purpose. And
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: this isn't an ability that some people have and some
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: others don't. And it's not about making excuses for yourself.
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: It's like, you know, well, that's just me and that's
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: just how I roll. It's a skill that we can
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: all practice, even the most sensitive among us, and I
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: put myself in that category. We can learn to pause
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: when fear shows up, to take a breath, to notice
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: it with curiosity, step back from it and ask, well,
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: actually not ask oh my god, how do I get
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: rid of this? But what is this showing me that
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: I care about? And how do I need to show
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: up right now? The more we practice, the easier it
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: becomes to balance that discomfort of fear or whatever uncomfortable
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: emotions showing up with clarity of what it's protecting us from.
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: So to feel fear is to care. To be anxious
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: is to care. To love is to fear rejection. To
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: have goals is to fear of failure. To care for
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: families to feel this fear for their well being. To
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: lead is to feel fear of letting others down. To
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: show up fully is to feel fear of being judge.
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: So you kind of getting the picture here. There's these
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: two sides of the coin. And we often talk about balance,
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: especially work life balance, But what if we started talking
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: about emotional balance, and that means learning to hold both
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: sides of these coin of this coin, the discomfort of
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: fear and the values that it actually reveals, because it
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: reveals so much about you that you may not be
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: seeing yourself, Because when we balance the pain with purpose,
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: that means that we can free ourselves to use our
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: precious time wisely. We can show up not just despite
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: the emotions, but alongside them, living more fully human and
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: being more fully ourselves. So this week, I invite you
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: to notice when fearsh up or anxiety or sadness or
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: whatever emotion is, that's that's super uncomfortable for you. And
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: rather than panicking and asking how do I get rid
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: of this? Try asking what does this tell me that
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: I care about? So I hope you found that valuable,
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: and I hope you all have a great week, and
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: I will catch you next Monday. See ya.