In a recent episode from my radio show, Uplift Your Life: Nourishment of the Spirit, my guest, Dean Sluyter, was funny while sharing so many good ideas on living with less fear. For instance, he encouraged people to do natural meditation. He doesn’t want people to struggle to clear their mind. Thoughts are always present. Even the Buddha couldn’t clear his mind of thoughts. Dean said, just notice the boundless OKness of everything as it is. Allow yourself to be pulled toward the peace and happiness that is already within you and always has been. To listen to this show, I encourage you to click here.
Dr. Paula’s Tip of the Week
My Tip from my e-book, 33 Tips for Self-Empowerment is: Turn Fear Into Love: Fear is an illusion. Use it to create the positive. When you go into fear, ask yourself: “What quality of love do I need more of —compassion, forgiveness, patience, empathy, understanding?” Then look for ways to bring that quality more strongly into your life. Where there is love, there can be no fear. Just like lighting a candle makes a room less dark, bringing in thoughts of love, diminishes fear. When we fully accept that we are always connected to the love within ourselves and in the Universe, fear will have nothing to hold onto. It will have to drop away. Since it’s hard to stay in that place of love, we need to keep bringing ourselves back there. Every time fear comes in, we can bring our thoughts to love. Pick something particularly wonderful and use it on a regular basis to bring your thoughts and emotions back to love.
Dr. Paula’s Silver Lining Story
Today I have two silver lining stories. The first one was sent to me by a listener and was written by the owner of Hummingbird Farms. It came with a gift that Janice received for her birthday. “With every shipment that goes out, I can’t help but reflect on our humble beginning: it was early 2003 and I had romantic plans to grow lavender with my husband on our farm in the Texas Hill country. By the end of that year, at age 38, I was diagnosed with breast cancer. Little did I know then that my dream of farming lavender and my unexpected illness would work together to inspire the establishment of our company, Hummingbird Farms, and a unique collection of bath and body products. After my diagnosis the farm became my sanctuary and I would spend hours in the lavender fields. I began to suffer from severe skin irritability during my treatment, and with little success combating the issue, my true passion was born: to create aloe-based body care products, scented naturally with aromatic plant ingredients, while staying true to my simple philosophy – what you put on your body is equally as important as what you put in your body. Through my breast cancer journey, something unexpected evolved. These products are my silver lining and nothing makes me happier than to get to share them with you. With love, Debi”.
My second silver lining story is about me. I was with a new friend this week, and I noticed how often she said, “I’m afraid.” I wasn’t judging. I was just noticing. Maybe I was particularly sensitive to those words because of our topic today or maybe because of my own history of debilitating fears. Whatever the reason, it helped me realize how much I’ve changed over the years and how rare it is that fear creeps in and when it does, how I can deal with it in a variety of ways that allows me to keep moving forward. I’m even able to shift the fear of making a wrong decision by giving myself the gifts of patience and trust in myself until discernment and clarity emerge. Recognizing my own growth in this area was a huge silver lining.
Marian Stephens’ Story
As I am experiencing my feelings and emotions, I am struggling to find balance. I am working every day on recognizing, feeling, and letting go of emotion, and I have been relatively successful. Things became very volatile in my house last week, just for a few minutes, and it was like a floodgate opened. I felt every fear, anger, hurt, and pain pierce through my chest. I started to cry. And, I continued. I continued crying all day. Then the next day. And the next. I am not sure why I was crying. It is not that I don’t have legitimate reasons to feel upset; I do. However, the intensity of my emotions and the volume of my tears was, and even now is, a little unsettling. I have found a certain amount of resolution, and can also explain away the behavior, but I am overrun with questions for myself. Dean Sluyter says that our negative emotions are like monsters looming above us; full of hot air composed of our thoughts. I really feel that I have been unwittingly attracting and thus battling these monsters by dwelling on my past. The silver lining of this breakdown is that I now realize the magnitude and significance of an emotional battle that was occurring deep inside. And to let go is to defeat an ominous and imposing enemy, and to defeat that enemy is to truly heal, and to truly heal is an achievement I can be proud of and grow indefinitely stronger from.
Dr. Paula’s tip of the week is: When you go into fear, ask yourself: “What quality of love do I need more of — compassion, forgiveness, patience, empathy, understanding?” This is an excellent question, and I am not sure of the answer. Part of me says I need more of all of them. I wrote a poem to help myself sort through this range of emotions, and I can conclude that I have survived many painful experiences. Without ever breaking.
I am not strong enough to endure putting my child in the psych hospital.
I cannot do this, I will break.
But, I don’t.
I harden my heart, I send the part of me that is buckling
To sit on the bench in the back of my brain
And, I send him away.
Perhaps I have experienced what feels like a breakdown because I am experiencing more compassion, forgiveness, patience, empathy, and understanding than I ever have before from my husband. So, I feel safe enough to let go. But, I still feel afraid. One part of my feeling safe will be my children showing me these types of love. This means that I need to shower them with these elements of love. To get myself to the state of calmness this requires, I am going to “breathe through my feet” as Deal Sluyter suggests and then I’m going to meditate to re-inflate.
Dr. Paula’s Coaching Response
Crying is a powerful way to release fears and painful thoughts, emotions and experiences. Here are two more techniques I use in the middle of the night, in the morning or when experiencing fear, anxiety or negativity:
- Say this over and over again in your mind, like a mantra: Peace in my mind Peace in my body Peace in my spirit Peace in my soul
- Visualize a rainbow with silver sparkles in it or draw it and carry it with you. Just looking at it will remove fear and replace it with love.
As you wisely point out, after releasing, you then need to refill yourself. Breathing energy up through your feet and meditating are good ways to do this. Here are some additional techniques:
- Do something fun to fill yourself with joy and laughter.
- Imagine that pink light is coming from the heavens and going to the top of your head. Breathe that pink light into your body and see it going through the top of your head and filling your body. Do this several times. Pink is emotionally healing and also the color of success.
- Take a walk in nature and feel the love from the plants, trees, birds and all of nature filling you and caressing you.
- Bring your thoughts to someone or something that makes you happy and reminds you of all of the love available to you when you choose to focus on it and fill yourself with it.
- Pet a beloved animal, hug someone or hug yourself. Allow yourself to feel the love being transmitted and shared.
For more shows on Reducing Fear:
- Fear: Friend or Foe? with Rabbi David Stern on March 12, 2015
- Master Your Thoughts with Karen Fry on November 3, 2016
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Dr. Paula, The Life Doctor, has helped thousands of people improve their health, wealth and relationships through writing, coaching and speaking. Contact her today to get started on your personal journey.
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To hear more shows from Uplift Your Life: Nourishment of the Spirit, please click here.
