What Are You Most Afraid Of?

What scares you? So much that you won’t allow yourself to finally thrive?

I look at my life reflectively and stare at the words I wrote in my Morning Pages, while I hear my daughter’s light snore in the background. Soothing and so comforting. Ironically it is the complete opposite of the inner turmoil I was experiencing.

So here’s the deal:

I had found myself in a pattern. A cycle of starting and not finishing of quitting in the middle when the going got tough or when any mild inconvenience came up. I would throw in the towel and give myself a depreciating talk most contrary to a pep talk. Talking down at myself and dismissing my wins, disguising them as losses. Walking around with a big L painted on my chest. When was the breaking point? When did I stop doing and where did I freeze? What I had found out this past year was freezing was not a character trait, something I was just born with, it wasn’t who I was but in fact a trauma response. Something that resulted out of what was done to me. Whew. There was fight, there was flight and then there was freeze. And man did I froze. It got ice cold around me and I was on the brink of turning into an ice sculpture.

Here’s the thing: What makes ice melt is heat, so I brought in the heat. By moving my body, working out, eating healthy, praying and meditating and praying some more, taking one step after the other. With every formed habit that was contributing to a better me, I started thawing and getting out of the freeze state that fear had me in. Letting fear grip me had been the most normal thing to me and I was dead set on breaking out of the toxic relationship I had with it. Was it the fear of failure? Fear of being seen?  Fear of being “cringe”? No one is paying as much attention to you as you are. The most someone might give you is a solid minute or two and then that’s it, they will be occupied with another thing. Or maybe a quick glance in your direction and then they’ll go about their day. That video you thought of as cringe might be the highlight of someones day. That outfit you talked yourself into not wearing because of what others might think, can give you a confident boost and maybe even inspire someone else to go for that look. As someone who is in her head a lot and analyses everything with the precision of a world class scientist (think Sheldon Cooper - and yes I know he’s a fictional character but just roll with me here), getting out of my head is the most difficult thing. I liked to talk myself out of things before they have even started, liked to see all the things that spoke against something instead of seeing everything that spoke for it. Why did I do that? I blame fear and the hold it had on me or better yet the hold I allowed it to have on me. Add on to the fact that I would happen to have conversations with people that saw the worst in everything, I had the perfect recipe for disaster. This is also a reminder to choose the people that you confide in wisely. Having people that don’t increase your fears and magnify your insecurities but instead encourage you, uplift you mentally, emotionally and spiritually. People that give you constructive criticism not destructive criticism has been a life changer for me and changed the way I view everything around and within me for the better.

My question for this week is: What are you afraid of? What is holding you back? What has you in a chokehold so bad, you’re letting life pass you by with each passing minute? So much so that the end of the year is approaching and you haven’t been able to move an inch from where you began at the beginning of the year? No judgement, I am not talking about huge leaps and fulfilling everything you had on your mood board but being at the exact same spot with no change at all, is something we are working hard on avoiding on this side.

The best thing anyone can do is bring in the heat, by actively working against fear. Not just talking the talk but walking the walk. I am currently at a stage in my life where I am finding out who I really am and who I want to be, there’s been a resurgence, so strong that I don’t define myself by what I used to do or patterns that I had found myself in. The beauty of life is that it is possible to break out of patterns, it may require sacrifices and a lot of sweat but it can also be very rewarding. Don’t let fear keep you from living your best life.

Love,

Maame.