Acknowledging Fears
March 22, 2020
I have appreciated hearing that the various tools I am offering are helping ! We are each unique with different needs on different days. Therefore, having numerous tools in our spiritual tool box, allows us to use the ones that work for us on that day and ignore the others that don’t.
We have been mostly talking about calming our fears and reducing our anxiety and stress. However, it is also important to look at the other side of the coin...naming our fears. Sometimes we are trying so hard to not feel our fear that we keep stuffing them and stuffing them until eventually something has to give. This “something” could be overreacting to someone, getting a cold because our immune system is weakened or simply feeling bound up. You know how sometimes you just need to have a good cry and afterwards you feel much better? It’s the same thing here.
There is a difference between naming and acknowledging our fears and living in our fears. One is a release and the other is a holding on.. One is short-term and the other is long-term. One allows us to hear scary information, process it and move on and the other is to grab on, hold tight and keep feeding it with more and more scary information. One is beneficial and healthy and the other is not.
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Today’s Suggested Practice
Naming Your Fears - Take a few minutes to name every fear from little to huge that you are feeling right now. Name everything that rises from health to work to money to family to dying to suffering to feeling isolated to running out of supplies; everything ! Don’t be concerned that you are adding to the fear bubble that’s being produced in the world right now. We are going to move it onward below.
You might write these fears down in a journal. You might write them each on a separate piece of paper. You might say them outloud to a trusted friend or family member in your home or on the phone. You might say them to G!d, the Universe, your guardian angel, a loved one who has passed or the sky.
Handing Your Fears Over - Now that all of your fears are laid out on the table, we can now literally and/or metaphorically watch them dissipate. Like prayers or meditations or well wishes or positive affirmations that we put “out there,” we trust that they are accepted. Hand these fears over. Maybe you can burn the individual pieces of paper or the page in your journal and watch them turn to ash. Maybe you can visualize them being sent out into the huge blue ocean or into the blue sky. Maybe you can tie them to a balloon and watch them float away. Maybe you can hand them over to G!d, the Universe, your guardian angel or a loved one who has passed and trust that they can handle it.
As with all suggestions, there really isn’t a wrong way to do this. It’s naming and letting go. Do it as often as you need to until you feel that tightness in the belly or the chest or the throat soften.
