The Fear and Anxiety Solution (11 page)

You may be thinking, “What if I don’t know how what I want feels or looks like? And how can I correctly do these steps to clearly define what I want if I have never had any of these positive feelings?” Don’t worry. There’s more you can do to become clear and motivated.

Let’s say your goal is to be peaceful, confident, or optimistic; however, you find that you have a hard time imagining these wonderful feelings because you’re convinced that you’ve experienced only the lack of them, in the forms of anxiety, insecurity, and uneasiness. Now is that really true? Haven’t there been moments in your life when you basked in these positive feelings, even if those times were brief?

We all have an enormous reservoir of past experiences stored in our subconscious. What we need to do is to bring the positive memories to light. You might recall the calmness that overcame you when you were somewhere in nature, in a church, or in a temple. You might remember the delicious peace you felt on a quiet Sunday morning while you were gently drifting back and forth between being asleep and awake. You might bring to mind the moment of pride you felt on your graduation day, the confidence you felt after your first promotion, or the overwhelming joy you felt when you first glimpsed at your newborn child. And you may recover the memory of your favorite pet, who used to look at you with unconditional love and adoration. For the subconscious mind, the circumstances aren’t as important as the energy and quality of the emotion they evoked. Remembering, reliving, and embracing even the briefest instances of positive feelings are sufficient for your subconscious to comprehend what you would like to experience more of in the future.

As you consult your memory to tap into positive, enticing emotions, intentionally immerse yourself in the past. Allow your mind and your body to fully reexperience the events and their circumstances using the following steps:

        
1. Take a stroll down memory lane
and revisit empowering, uplifting, or calming episodes in your life. Make a list of those special moments and focus on how you felt during those times.

        
2. Try to describe those feelings
and then notice where you can still sense them in your body. As soon as you register such a positive sensation in
your physical body, your subconscious mind designates this emotion as a resource that is instantly available to you from now on.

        
3. Repeat this process with several different memories,
so you can stock up on these resources until it’s fairly easy for you to access the desired emotion.

By the way, to reassure your skeptical side, let me tell you that recalling positive situations and the emotions connected with them has nothing to do with living in the past or pretending. All you’re doing is instructing your subconscious about what you want, so that you can steer it more precisely toward your goals and preferences. As I’ve said before, I believe that our subconscious is in many ways superior to our conscious mind, but it still requires our conscious input to operate and support us in the most beneficial way.

Despite all your efforts, if you have felt anxious and insecure for a long time, you may not be able to imagine how it will feel to be confident and joyful again. The gap may seem so wide that you can’t envision leaping across it, let alone believe you’ll ever be on the other side. If this is the case for you, it can be very useful to define the substages that will bridge the gap between where you are now and where you want to end up.

For example, focus on feeling a bit of hope or being a little calmer or more relaxed for at least part of the day. Then focus on being willing to give your inner-change work a good effort. Once you have been able to climb to higher emotional levels, you can then concentrate on appreciating some of the success you’ve had so far, which will get you closer to confidence and self-empowerment.

Don’t rush or push yourself. Take your time and make sure that each of the emotional stepping stones you’re advancing to feels solid and stable. Patience is a powerful ally on your path to change. As you contemplate your goals, keep in mind that at any time you can go back and adjust them. With a greater understanding of yourself, you will gain greater clarity of your ambitions and desires.

Although it may appear redundant at first glance, this question is different from the previous one, “What do you want?” The former provides the general
direction. If you don’t know where you want to go, it’s difficult to know if you’ve arrived. The question “How will you know that you’ve reached your goals?” asks you to focus on specific convincers, the evidence that clearly indicates to you that you’ve reached your destination and accomplished your intentions.

As an analogy, let’s say you want to travel to Paris. As soon as you spot the Eiffel Tower, you know that you’ve arrived in the City of Lights. This landmark is what convinces you that you’re in Paris. But would just knowing you’re in Paris fulfill your dreams of traveling there? Would you then turn back toward the airport, telling yourself, “Been there, done that”? Probably not, because arriving in Paris isn’t enough for you. There’s so much more you want to explore and experience: the Louvre, Notre Dame, Sacré-Coeur Basilica, and all that delicious food.

Convincers are the landmarks, the specific ingredients that make the difference between where you are now and where you want to be. They need to be specific, enticing, and, ideally, measurable. Convincers give your motivation toward your destination an additional boost.

Your “what do you want?” goals could be to feel confident and relaxed and to go about life in self-empowered ways. What would demonstrate to you that you’ve achieved these goals? Maybe you are able to stay calm and secure during a performance review with your boss. Maybe you can talk comfortably with complete strangers during a party. If procrastination is a part of your anxiety challenge, perhaps you’ve paid your bills on time and followed through with all your commitments for at least three months in a row.

Convincers define in more detail the parameters for success. We all thrive on success, on achieving what we’ve set out to do. Success reassures us that we have potential and capabilities. It provides us with the motivation to keep going or aim for even higher goals. But what or who usually defines success for you? Are you truly self-reliant and do you decide for yourself whether you’ve succeeded or failed? Or do you tend to let others make that call because you don’t have enough trust in your own judgment? There is hardly anything more personal than the journey of growth and self-empowerment on which you’ve embarked, so it makes sense that only you can define what success means to you.

As you go through this very personal process, you may have moments of doubt and discouragement, wondering whether you’re on the right track and
whether you’ve made any progress at all, despite your efforts. Some people in your life won’t appreciate and approve of your changes, your newfound confidence and inner peace, as much as you would hope for, which may further add to your uncertainty. Others may passionately tell you what they
know
is best for you, expecting you to accept and comply with their “brilliant” ideas. Having a clear concept about some important end points of your inner journey will help you stay focused, unwavering, and motivated on
your
goals until you reach your destination.

1. Imagine how you will interact differently with the world around you when you’ve reached your goals but nothing outside of you has significantly changed.
The people in your life, job, and the place you live are all still the same. How would you act differently around these people and in your normal environment once you’ve reached your goals? For example, you might say, “I would speak more openly and directly with my spouse,” “I would no longer take the grumpiness of my coworker personally,” or “I would be able to go to sleep in a clutter-free bedroom.”

2. Pick a few challenging situations that have often triggered fear and anxiety for you. Imagine how you might feel about and deal with these challenges in a different, more resourceful way.
What responses to these challenges would convince you that you’ve changed and reached your goals? And how many times would you have to experience these positive changes to trust that they are permanent? Find the balance between realistic and fantastic. In other words, create a vision that is believable and exciting at the same time. For example, “I could say no and create healthy boundaries when my boss asks me to work overtime on the weekends,” “I would tell my neighbors to turn their music way down if they were blasting it again at 2:00 a.m.,” “I would calmly watch my kids leaving for their overnight camp, knowing that they will be alright, and would enjoy a nice evening with my spouse.”

3. Set up motivational intermediate convincers.
There’s always a way to get to where you want to go. Maybe you’re more comfortable with defining intermediate goals that keep you focused and on track or taking smaller steps at first and moving through a series of solidifying resting places between where you are now and where you want to be. What smaller goals would you like to
reach in order to prove to yourself that you’ve gained ground and made some progress? For example, “I would go to the grocery store in sweatpants and still feel good about myself,” “I would openly share with my friends that I am working on breaking through my fears and insecurities,” or “I would admit to others when I have made a mistake or was wrong.”

Whether you like to focus on one intermediary stepping stone at a time or feel ready to take greater leaps, the pace of this journey is totally up to you. Convincers help you along the way by making your successes more real and believable, thus reenergizing your motivation to go even further than you thought possible for you.

To paraphrase Anthony Robbins, a well-known life strategist, writer, and inspirational speaker, “The more powerful the
why
you decide to do anything, the greater the likelihood for you to succeed.” Any change and growth usually stirs up some inner resistance. Maybe you’re concerned that people will no longer like you after you’ve changed, or you doubt that you really deserve a better life. Or maybe you’re tempted to slip into the familiar grooves of old habits because it feels more comfortable there than it does to change. Maybe you’re telling yourself impatiently, “This is too hard” and let the momentary lack of trust and drive break your momentum. These are just some of the usual suspects, which, if you don’t have strong enough reasons to maintain your goals, might tempt you to give up and retreat to the old comfort zone. The
why
question is your litmus test for finding out whether or not you’re ready to jump off the fence and truly go ahead and change. Is there enough energy behind your decision to move forward?

Behind most of our activities is the driving force of a powerful
why,
which keeps us going even during times when we would rather stay in bed or take a vacation. The
whys
are closely connected to our core values and function as a stable, foundational current, although they are not always in the forefront of our minds.

How many mothers or fathers do you know who’ve forgotten what it means to relax and let themselves be taken care of because during the few moments they’re not changing diapers, cooking, cleaning, driving to soccer practice, and maybe working at another job, they’re thinking about what else needs to be done? How many small business owners do you know who sacrifice all their
time and energy to keep their enterprise going? What about diehard marathon runners who repeatedly endure the pain and agony of grueling, long-distance races? How many of those people actually gave up their kids, their businesses, or their runs?

None of them, right? Or at least they didn’t without extenuating circumstances. But while they pursued their missions and objectives, there were also those moments when they had to dig inside and somehow find additional energy and resources to get over obstacles and keep themselves forging forward. And when the greatest push and effort were required—just when they were digging the deepest—a little voice inside asked, “Why am I doing this?” Their answers could be, “Because I want my kids to be happy and healthy,” “Because I want my business to succeed,” or “Because I love to run, love to finish.” I’m sure you had similar experiences yourself. The strength and resilience of the human spirit is astonishing. And it’s the
whys
behind what we do that allow us to tap into that strength.

Twelve years ago, realizing
why
helped me go beyond my perceived limitations and ultimately change my life. I was in the high desert of New Mexico at a kundalini yoga retreat. It was my birthday, and I was bracing myself for a long day of meditation and exercise with 1,600 other yogis and yoginis. Soon it became clear that, unlike us, the air wouldn’t move all day. By 9:30 a.m., the temperature had climbed to 100 degrees.

Still, I felt ready for the first of many challenging and invigorating meditations. Keep in mind this was not the sitting-on-a-pillow-and-letting-your-thoughts-float-away kind of meditation. Part of the philosophy of this retreat was that by going through physically demanding exercises, we could overcome mental blocks and clear our psyches of emotional baggage. I admit this was a rather heroic approach, given the heat and the fact that each posture is supposed to be held for either thirty-one or sixty-two minutes straight. But it worked for me. As soon as the amnesia kicked in, letting me forget the pain, I decided to return each year.

The facilitator didn’t know it was my birthday, so he didn’t cut me any slack—and I am certain he wouldn’t even if he knew. The first meditation he introduced involved holding up our arms at a sixty-degree angle while chanting a specific mantra and locking eyes with the person sitting opposite us for
only
sixty-two minutes. Murmurs of disbelief and nervous laughter went through the room. Everybody held onto the slim hope that the facilitator was joking.
But since he never joked and offered not even the faintest smile, all we could do was to surrender to our inevitable fate.