ABGW explores the pervasive impact of fear on our lives
Cheryl: You. Have you ever wondered why, even in the safety of what seems like a good life, shadows of fear still loom, affecting your happiness and freedoms? Well, today, we're delving deep, profound deep into understanding the pervasive impact of fear on our lives and how it shapes our decisions, our relationships and our self-image and what might change if we could face and transform those fears. Hello, everyone, and welcome to ABGW. Amazing, brilliant, gorgeous, wonderful. Where we're redefining trauma recovery from struggle to strength, today, we've got Rapid Rockets, our extra episodes designed to answer your questions about the courage within overcoming fear with empowerment. Now, these episodes are all about helping you to find the actionable steps that are right for you right now so that you're working smarter and not more complex. Today's episode is more than just a conversation. It's about the stepping stones that will lead you towards a life filled with empowerment and healing. And if you're ready to embrace change and make m meaningful steps towards your trauma recovery and resilience, then you're definitely in the right place. I invite you, my friends, to commit to taking at least one action that resonates with you on this journey so that you have the results that you love after listening to this episode. Because I want you to have the life you love more often than not, but remember, if you're not ready for this commitment, that's okay. This journey is yours to begin when you are ready. But for those of us sticking around, your questions have come from social interactions on Facebook, Instagram, and private messages. I've also included some that are essential to make everything make sense. So, let's dive straight in.
Fear can significantly influence our decisions in such a negative way.
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Nyah: What is the impact of fear on my life?
Cheryl: To me, fear can significantly influence our decisions in such a negative way. I mean, it limits our ability to do activities, interact in many ways, and enjoy life. Much like if we had a physical thorn in our side that goes untreated, fear festers and grows, affecting many aspects of our lives. That's why it's so important to confront what it is that is hurting us so that we can move past it. M.
Nyah: How can I identify my fears?
Cheryl: So one of the ways that you can identify your fears is just to become more aware of your reactions and the decisions that you make. It's all about awareness and looking at your behaviours and considering what fears might be driving them. Um, what you can do is make a list of all the concerns that you have that you're consciously aware of and identify which ones are causing you the most distress or the ones that you think are limiting you in some way. So, for example, with my friend Stephen, because he had had failures in the past, or what he perceived as failures in the past, it stopped him from being able to move past, uh, his fear of failure. But the thing is, he went on to have a successful business. So it is possible. But the thing is, it's about having that awareness, first of all, and, um, being and not being. I know it sounds wild not being afraid to acknowledge that, even to yourself. And that's the first step.
There are several techniques that can help you deal with fear.
Nyah: What are some techniques for dealing with fear?
Cheryl: So there are several techniques that can help you deal with fear. There's, uh, emotional freedom technique, which I love. There's a second method, there's hypnotherapy, and there's meditation. Those are the main ones. And if you're looking to, um, how can I describe it? If you're looking to understand why you behave the way you do, then, of course, go and see, ah, a psychologist or a psychotherapist. But to me, the reason why I love hypnotherapy so much is that hypnotherapy is not interested in making any judgment about why you think or behave the way you do. Hypnotherapy is interested in the Do you want to change what you're doing, yes or no? And if the answer is yes, hypnotherapy is one of the quickest and easiest ways of you dealing with what is holding you back. So you also might want to generally start writing in a journal because, for me, it's one of the most powerful tools for understanding and processing your fears. And it's such a safe space that, uh, journal, no one else has to see it, no one else has to read it. And you can be honest with yourself. You can be totally honest about the things that you would probably think are totally irrational. I remember, um, the fear that I had was I had a fear of being successful. And so what I did was I used journaling as one of the tools in my toolkit to just try and understand why I had this fear, why I had this fear of succeeding. And I know that a lot of that harks back to what I experienced in childhood. I was never encouraged to celebrate the successes I had. In fact, anytime that I was successful, I would get told, well, if I got a, uh, b grade, you should have got an a., Or if I got, ah, a grade, um, you should have got a plus. And I was never ever in my childhood experienced that enjoyment of success. So, I was surprised to find out what it felt like. So, I spent a lot of my life fearing doing things that I knew would make me happy and help me feel successful. And that's why journaling is such a powerful way of doing it in the quiet. No one else needs to know that you're doing this. And you can do it in a way that is empowering you. You can write a little bit or a lot or not write at all, you don't have to do it every day. But the thing is, you do it, and you can be totally honest with yourself about what you're feeling and what's going on for you.
Nyah: How can I gradually overcome my fear?
Cheryl: The thing is, it's about what you want to achieve. You can deal with your fears a little bit at a time. So if you're, say, for example, afraid of public speaking, which is quite a common fear, you can start by giving a speech to a small, safe audience, like a, uh, child or a close relative, and then gradually increase the audience size as your confidence grows. Um, the most important thing to me is about how you view it. So, it's about gradually exposing yourself in ways that can help build your tolerance for any fear-inducing situation that you have. So, one of the techniques that I really love in hypnotherapy is called perceptual positions. And it's basically where you almost move back a position further back from the situation that you find upsetting. So you're almost looking at yourself, looking at yourself doing something, and that helps you to desensitize to that phobia or that fear. And it's a brilliant way of using the imagination to help you help yourself overcome your concerns. Amazing, brilliant, gorgeous, wonderful. Helping women just like you who are unhappy, perhaps even with your supposedly quote-unquote good life. This is a mum-and-daughter duo. Ah. We are not pulling any punches as we explore trauma recovery and ideas for building resilience so you work smarter uh and definitely not harder to create a transformational life, a life you love more often than not.
How can you change your perspective on failure? So, for me, it's important.
Nyah: How can I change my perspective on failure?
Cheryl: So, for me, it's important to develop a new understanding of failure. We learn how to respond to things, and it's about almost restarting again that level of understanding. So that instead of seeing it as something to be feared, which, unfortunately, a lot of society, um, puts on us, it kind of makes us afraid to fail anything or for something not to go right. What's important to me when I'm working with someone and helping them look at their perspective is to consider it as a learning opportunity. Just like how you learn to walk and you learn to talk. When you learn to walk, you don't think about, oh, I've got to move this muscle and contract that one. You just knew you had something in mind, you had a goal in your head, and you just did it. You just went for it. Just like when I see my granddaughter, do you know what I mean? Walking, huh? You can see her mind working things out. It's like, that's what I want to do. And she pulls herself up, and she goes and does it, and no one turns around and says to her, you can't walk. What are you doing? Do you know what I mean? The amount of times I see her stumble, um, and fall down, and she just gets back up and just carries on. And that's the kind of mindset that you need to rediscover in order to move past, um, the fears that you're having and what's holding you back, not just in one area of your life, but in all areas of your life. Just having that learning mindset that you had as a child, where you would just explore and just see what happens. So, instead of seeing it as something to be feared, consider it as a learning opportunity and ask yourself what you can learn. Ask yourself what you can learn from each failure and how you can apply these lessons to your life. And this shift, this little shift in your perspective, can help reduce the fear associated with failure because that's what it is. Uh, that fear of failure can be moved slightly, and then you can look at it in a different way, in a more empowering, a more resourceful way.
The more fears you have, the less freedom you truly enjoy
Nyah: What is the relationship between fear and personal freedom?
Cheryl: The more fears you have, the less freedom you truly enjoy. So it's almost like the difference between freedom, um, and liberty. We're really lucky. I live in the UK, and we live in a society where we're at liberty to come and go as we please. As long as we don't break the law and have to go to prison, we can pretty much do whatever we want. But freedom is something that's inside you. It's something that's innate to you. So, fears can limit what actions you take, what choices you make, and your overall ability to fulfil your life and engage in life, rather than just existing, actually thriving and enjoying life and having a good time. And to me, by working to overcome your fears, you can increase that freedom. You can reclaim what is yours; you can reclaim your life and move from just existing to thriving. So what's important is understanding that you do have freedom. You have the freedom to choose. What are you going to choose? What kind of life are you going to choose for yourself? Now that you know that you have this inner ability to do these things? What are you going to do now? What are these decisions? What choices are you going to make? Having that knowledge now, maybe you didn't even realize it before we spoke now, I want you to make a decision at this moment, to just think about some of the things that may be holding you back and, uh, making that decision, to maybe tackle one of them and just see what happens, see what happens when you explore new perspective, new horizons.
Hypnotherapy works on accessing your unconscious mind, where many fears reside.
Nyah: How can hypnotherapy help in overcoming fears?
Cheryl: Hypnotherapy is, to me, such a powerful tool. I think it's seriously, I think it's one of the best tools ever, um, for overcoming fears, because it works on accessing your unconscious mind, where many of your fears and phobias reside. That's where they are. They're not in your conscious mind; they're not in the bit that you access all the time. They're deep-seated in your subconscious. By looking into the subconscious mind and understanding how we learn, we don't learn sequentially; we learn in intuitive leaps. And that's why it's important to work where the problem is, in the unconscious mind, helping to change our negative thought patterns. And the thing is, through hypnotherapy, you can learn to respond differently, just differently, and reduce the impact those fears have on your life. Hypnotherapy is also really good at uncovering the root causes of the fears, allowing you to address them and heal them at their core. So, by delving into your subconscious mind, hypnotherapy can help you identify the past traumas and experiences that may have contributed to your fears. So, it may not just be one incident; it may have been a series of incidents that contributed to your fears. And this deeper understanding can provide just such valuable insights and pave the way for healing and transformation. Also, hypnotherapy is really good at assisting with building confidence and self-esteem, the self-compassion that you need, which is essential to overcome your fears. By accessing the power of hypnotherapy, the power of just us having a conversation, and the way that I, as your hypnotherapist, the way that I suggest things to you, I can help you visualize yourself facing and conquering your fears, not only with ease but a way that means that you're successful. And this positive, it's like a positive reinforcement loop, uh, that gradually rewires your brain and reshapes your belief systems and empowers you to approach the things that have been holding you back, but not only that, other fear-inducing situations with a newfound sense of courage and resilience. And, um, hypnotherapy also promotes relaxation and stress reduction, uh, because fears, as you know, are often triggered by that flight or fights and response that we have to fear. Um, that's what leads to the anxiety and the heightened tension. And through hypnotherapy, you learn deep relaxation techniques that you can learn to employ in your daily life, which helps calm your nervous system and create, um, a state of real serenity. This relaxed state not only helps you to manage your fears but also allows you to approach life with a sense of balance, that emotional balance that you have. And then it allows you to just have some more clarity over, uh, what's going on for you. So, if I was to sum hypnotherapy up, I would say it's a holistic approach to overcoming your fears by addressing the underlying causes, building confidence, and promoting a relaxed state, um, where you can embark on it is a truly transformational journey towards conquering your fears and living a life you love more often than not, by living a life of freedom and empowerment.
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