You want to know a secret? My clients and class participants all trust me to hold confidentiality with the most intimate details of their business, but I’m going to go public with one detail I know. I’m going to tell you the straight-up fact, the one that no one tells anyone else.
They all get scared. Gut-clenching scared. Scared witless. (And me, too.)
If you’re going to be a business owner, especially in the early years of the start-up phase, then fear is going to be your friend.
You hear all these buzz phrases about fear, such as ‘Well, you know, fear stands for False Experience Appearing Real. So, just overcome your fear! Come’on!’
Baloney. Tell that to me when my mortgage is due in three days, and the money coming in is half what I need it to be. Who wouldn’t be scared?
Anyone who is building a small business gets scared. It’s normal.
Scared about the money. Scared about whether anyone likes what you’re offering. Scared about whether you are doing the right thing. Just plain nervous, anxious, and frightened.
So, if it’s so common, how come it’s so hard to deal with it?
Well, the main thing about fear isn’t that it’s hard to deal with. It’s that it’s so hard NOT to deal with it. Avoiding fear is hard. ‘Overcoming’ fear is a herculean task. But it’s easy to just be scared.
You are allowed to be scared. There is no one else who isn’t scared at times. Give yourself time to be afraid (and it doesn’t always have to wake you up at 3am in the morning because you didn’t let yourself be scared during your work day.)
When scared, say to yourself: “This is normal. It’s okay. I’m allowed to be scared.”
What is fear? Did you ever have a friend, or a parent, or a spouse who, when you were about to rush out the door to an important event, grabbed you and said, ‘Hold it, don’t forget your lunch, and your ticket to get in!’
Fear is that friend.
Fear in business doesn’t come up because you did something wrong, you’re doomed, or you look funny. 🙂 Fear comes up because you’re not seeing some gorgeous, valuable and much-needed jewel right where you’re standing, and it will absolutely not let you go out that door without it.
Maybe, just maybe, instead of trying to ‘overcome’ your fear, you should listen to it?
But, there is a trick to listening to fear, without which you won’t find what’s right in front of your face. Want to learn the trick, and read an example of how it works?
Keys to Hearing Your Fear
• Notice the physical sensation of fear- and revel in it.
Fear has physical sensations- what are they for you? In other words, how do you know you’re afraid? For me, my low belly has a hollow-dropped-out feeling. Then, my reaction to the hollowness is to clench my shoulders, my chest, and my jaw so I stop breathing as deeply- it keeps me from feeling the hollowness.
If I slowly relax the clenching, and focus in on the hollow feeling I notice, hey, it’s just a hollow feeling. I let myself get intimate with it- really feel that hollow feeling, get comfortable and familiar with it. Breath into it. Already you should start to feel more spacious and calm.
• What’s the story the fear is telling, and what is the core of truth in it?
Your fear is talking to you. It’s often saying things like, “You can’t do this.” “You shouldn’t be doing this.” “It will never work.” Things like that.
The funny thing is, most of the time these phrases are TRUE- but incomplete. For instance, “You can’t do this… alone.” Or, “You shouldn’t be doing this… right now.” Or, “It will never work… if you don’t rest.”
A warning signal brings through an important message for you, but then you clamp down from the fear, and miss the most critical and helpful part of the message. Bummer. But, it’s never too late to get the rest of the message.
How can you access this message? Once you settle into the physical part of the fear, accept the message you are hearing, “You can’t do this…” as true, and then ask in your heart, with a willingness to be surprised, for the rest of the message. It may take awhile, so be patient.
• My example: “You shouldn’t be here.”
It was one of my first times co-teaching with Dr. John Wadude Laird, someone who has been a spiritual teacher of mine for years. Fear was telling me ‘You shouldn’t be here,’ and I was feeling small, awkward, and out of place. Scared witless, actually. I spoke up in the class to deliver a point, and immediately felt worse- the fear shot way up.
After class Wadude (it’s a spiritual name that means ‘The Loving’… I could’ve taken the hint, eh?) came up to me and said: “I need to talk to you, after I talk to this person.” My fear jumped another ten notches. I wasn’t imagining it- he was going to blast me! I went to the bathroom, washed, and came back, steeling myself for the firing squad.
Here’s what he said:
“Mark- it was a hard decision to hire you for this position, because other people had been around longer. But, after teaching with you, I absolutely know deep in my heart that we made the right choice.”
Stunned, I thanked him, and walked away. What happened? I went through the two steps above, it took me about 30 minutes, but I eventually heard the whole message: “You shouldn’t be here, in this psychological place of doubting yourself, because you are trusted and loved, and you are in the right position.”
So, what message about your business has your friend Fear been shouting herself hoarse trying to get through to you?
20 Responses
Heck, between you and Havi, I’m practically looking forward to the next time fear raises its beautiful head!
@James – I’m glad you’re looking forward to the fear. There’s nothing more exhilirating, more enlivening, than being scared off your keister. I mean, why else… never mind, rant neatly aborted.
Here’s to fear! Or, as an semi-obscure punk band from the 80’s sang it: “Have a beer with Fear!”
@Mark – rants are great, if you’re not just repeating yourself keep ranting!
Yes, rants can be great- thanks for the support. I was just being a little tongue-in-cheek. 🙂
I am getting ready for a Speed Networking event (like Speed Dating only networking) and this article was right on cue. My fear was up for me and your article showed me how to listen to the whole message.
Here’s the message : “I can’t do this, I’m not ready for this. . . unless I’m rested and am ready to leave my house by 7AM.”
So, I asked my fear what that means and here is what showed up:
-Rested means not driving Aaron back to school on Sunday as I have some back challenges going on.
-Rested means journalling with an online program I’m taking that helps me process issues related to my back discomfort
-Rested means getting up at 5AM the morning of the event to meditate and stretch.
-Planning ahead means everything in the car the night before.
-Planning ahead means clothes, jewelry and makeup laid out this weekend to be sure I have everything
-Planning ahead means not feeding the animals til I get home instead of first thing in the morning.
-Planning ahead means getting the garbage together Sunday and putting it out Monday (garbage day is Tues)
The reward for all this – if I’m out of the house by 6:50AM I can stop at Starbucks for coffee. Otherwise, I’ll get it afterwards.
Thank you for helping me think through this Mark. The event isn’t til Tuesday and I was already working myself up without even knowing it.
I have a party this evening and now have the energy to go.
@Char- I’m glad this process had such concrete results for you. Did you enjoy your networking event?
I just discovered this today after starting your Remembrance Challenge. During Remembrance I asked for clarity because I’m scared to commit to my goal of being a published author.
And this is what I find right after meditating on that!
So right now, I’m thinking about listening to that fear of commitment and desire to run away and ask it what the rest of the message is.
Thank you!
Joely Black (@TheCharmQuark on Twitter)
So, Joely- I’m getting to back to you after a few days. What was the rest of the message?
Hi Mark,
I took a few Remembrance sessions to work on this.
The message is “This is too big for me to do alone.”
I’d become hooked on the idea of doing it all by myself. So I’ve had the courage to step out and ask for help. One of the things that’s been getting in my way has been that this is too big for me. So now I have other people helping me and bringing their own brilliance and contacts into the mix.
I’m going to reference this post when I write about fear later.
P.S. I really like that you ask math questions to prove that we’re real commenters. I must be the only personal on the planet who likes surprise math quizzes.
Joely Black (@TheCharmQuark on Twitter)
@Joely- That’s a great rest of the message, eh? Makes it all much easier… whew! This approach to fear was such a big revelation when it hit me, I’m relieved that it resonates so strongly with you, too.
Hey, I’m glad you like the pop math quizzes. That’s a bonus, eh? 🙂
So there I was, with my stomach knotted from the tension of unspecified causes, knowing only that I was physically feeling something that was caused by my mental state. I was journaling about it, and left my journal in order to find out “what to do when beating oneself up so much that it results in physically feeling ill”.
It didn’t occur to me that I was feeling fear, although I guess if I had to pin it down, I probably would’ve said anxiety, which I know is really just a fancy word for fear (useful when one’s greatest fear is fear itself). Maybe I did subconsciously know what I was feeling though, because I was drawn to several articles about fear.
Yours resonated with me because of its description of the physical symptoms, and the idea of where to go from there. I keep re-inflating my chest to encourage the spaciousness to help me feel calm enough to reason through this fear.
So what am I afraid of? I’m afraid:
* I’m going to fail;
* I’m going to let people down;
* I’ll never get this done.
The rest of the message seems to be, “…IF I don’t give this task a reasonable amount of attention, regularly, with an adequate amount of rest in between.” (I think I’m also partly afraid that in order to finish, I must work nonstop for weeks if not months, and so if I start working, I’ll never be able to let myself stop.)
My reaction to fear tends to be to avoid the thing I’m afraid to face. Of course this doesn’t help the situation, I always know this! However, in the short term, avoidance does take my attention away from the stress and so I sort of “feel better”. This is my reward for removing the stimulus, and so my behaviour of avoiding the fear is reinforced (negative reinforcement) and thus it repeats. Second verse, same as the first, a little bit louder and a little bit worse…
I’m really hoping that I can get better at directing my attention to the message and what I can do about it, instead of letting the symptoms and automatic reactions guide my way. It’s hard, when it’s this ingrained into me, but between this article and the one of Havi’s that led me here, I am feeling very encouraged.
.-= Qrystal’s lastest post: Resolving to Overcome My Stuckness =-.
Woo-hoo, Qrystal- glad to hear it. In my experience, making space and listening to the whole message often makes such a huge difference. I’m glad you’re feeling encouraged.
Greetings!
Thnx again for the gift of your wisdom. 🙂 I really needed to read this today – there are no co-incidences.
Been taught that fear is simply the edge of what you know, which has helped a great deal. I love the addition to that message of learning what the WHOLE of the message is, instead of the HOLE of it.
Bright Blessings & Good Fortune! 🙂
-Birdy! :>
Thanks for the encouragement.
I’ve never looked at fear that way before. Thanks for the insight.
Birdy, Trisha, Athena- I’m so glad! This was obviously a big one for me, too.
Just found this via your latest post about fear – and love your point about hearing the full message “you shouldn’t be here…. xyz”. It’s that xyz that makes ALL the difference – if only we can breathe enough to hear that last bit.
I’ve been doing more scary out-of-my-comfort-zone things in my biz thanks to working with your stellar mentor Jason Stein – and past that fear is a lot more calm and integrity than there was when I was blocked behind the fear.
Thanks, as ever
Corrina
Rock on! I’m glad you found this one. I can’t tell you how surprised I was to find that there was more to the message, and how much this continues to help me. I’m glad you are stepping out more and more through listening to the full message.
And Jason rocks!
Brilliant article, Mark and I so love your willingness to share your fragile but yet beautiful humanity. It is so endearing and causes me to trust you and your teachings at such a deep level. I will probably utilize this what is my fear telling me teaching a lot. Thanks so much for you. Roxanne
Hi Roxanne- thank you! So glad it landed for you. And I so appreciate you taking the time to let me know.