Feel the fear and do it anyway

If someone were to ask you “Are you fearful?”, how would you answer? It’s a surprise when some situations bring fear up in us. It is how we handle/respond to that fear that is the key to our success!  I was privileged to go through our Leadership Development Programme and thought I would share some snippets of what it taught me.

The biggest surprise for me on the programme was how fearful I was throughout the Leadership Development Programme even though I saw it as a great opportunity, privilege and was excited about it! The programme happened at a time where huge challenges and situations in my personal life presented themselves, that at any normal time would be overwhelming, but they came on top of the unexpected challenge of how it felt starting a new job after 9 years and learning so much.

I knew it was an experiential programme, but I hadn’t realised quite how much so and what would be expected of me in doing it. I didn’t know what was ahead. From the outset, I knew that I wanted to find my best self, refine my leadership, learn what hadn’t worked previously. We shared our challenges and concerns, mine were the physical side of the programme, climbing things & throwing myself off things and getting out of comfort zones I was in!

I learnt so much about my leadership style and how to adapt in every situation I am in. The first activity helped me to visualise aiming for and achieving my goals. I wanted to grow in boldness, courage and confidence – to allow my voice to be heard, and to get any comfort zones I had become stuck in – these surely set the scene for what was ahead.

For me, as every session ‘loomed’ (that’s fear talking!), it came with a GINORMOUS fear of the unknown. I say ‘Ginormous’, because that’s what fear does, it blows all normal reason out of all proportion. Reading the ‘what to bring/wear on the day’ and the not knowing what each session was going to be (until we turned up on the day) enveloped me in a FEAR that was completely overwhelming. This was a surprise, and at times, also an embarrassment to me – I now realise this was all part of the process!

Does fear silence you?

Does fear stop you in your tracks?

Does fear derail your day?

Is fear holding you back?

Is fear stifling your freedom and success?

Is your inner chatterbox telling you ‘you can’t do it’?

Fear is a liar; it is constantly lying to you, steals your joy and is often the biggest voice you can hear. I’m going to name this the FEAR ZONE – the zone where you have a complete lack of self-confidence, where situations intimidate you and silence YOU and YOUR voice, where you are almost rendered powerless, where you have this feeling that you simply cannot ‘do it’, whatever ‘do it’ is in that situation, where the ‘you can’t do it’ voices are so very loud in your head and you simply can’t see ahead of you. Your inner chatterbox can allow fear to overwhelm you.

Asking yourself ‘what’s behind this?’ opens the door to welcome the light into the darkness of that situation, which in turn shines the light on the WHY, the root cause of why you are experiencing this fear.

I like to see FEAR as False Expectations Appearing Real.

Sometimes, we simply have to do it afraid and find our inner courage. Joyce Meyer speaks a lot on fear, she says that “Courage is not the absence of fear; it is action in the presence of fear. Fear can steal anything if we let it. The only way to live free from fear is to confront it and ‘do it afraid’.”

As fear dissipates you can start to see the wood from the trees and you can see things clearer and see the beauty ahead of you.

Upon reflection I identified that I love to excel in my job and be amazing at what I love to do, so to find myself struggling with the ‘you don’t know what you don’t know until you realise you don’t know it’ and not liking the experience, was a revelation.

This revelation showed me that actually, I have a higher expectation of myself than others do and that I’m an expert at putting too much pressure on myself! Sound familiar? This too was a revelation to me.

Fear will keep your life small. If you listen to fear you will stay in your comfort zone. If you always stay in your comfort zone, your world will get smaller. Ask any seed about it’s life experience, it has to push through fear, out of its comfort zone when its in the dark, allow itself to grow until it sees the light, then can blossom and grow into something quite amazing!

Do yourself a favour and shut the voice of fear up and start believing that ‘you can do it’! Go on, I dare you, lets call fear out, feel the fear and do it anyway!

Our next programme starts in February 2023. If you want to invest in your leadership or a member of your teams’, get in touch to find out more or to book on our next Leadership Development Programme, info@pro-development.co.uk or 01904 628838.  Alternatively, coaching can really help to work through fears and if that is something that you feel would be of benefit, do not hesitate to get in touch.

This will be the last chance to access the fantastic 40% funding if you are an SME in York, North Yorkshire and the East Riding. This can be available for you or a team member to join our next Leadership Development Programme so get in touch now to discuss your/your teams needs.