You Are Not Alone
When I established my coaching practice nearly 10 years ago, I did not expect fear and anxiety to be the most common issues that my clients would present with. I remember my trainer saying, during one of my NLP certification courses, that, often we end up attracting the clients that experience the very issues that we ourselves have dealt with in our lives. As counsellors and coaches we can only take our clients as far as we have taken ourselves. As someone who has experienced fear and anxiety, I am able to understand and relate to my client’s experience. As someone who has gained understanding on how I create this state of mind and learned how to manage it, I am in a better position to support my clients in understanding and managing their own fears and anxieties. Persistence and patience are key here, as behavioural change is a gradual process.
“The best way to not feel hopeless is to get up and do something. Don’t wait for good things to happen to you. If you go out and make some good things happen, you will fill the world with hope, you will fill yourself with hope.”
― Barack Obama, former president of the United States
I have come to realise that the issue of fear and anxiety being so common is really not that surprising because it is the underlying cause of many other problems that clients struggle with. At the heart of low self- confidence is essentially fear of failure; at the core of avoiding relationships is fear of rejection, the act of shying from promotions could be linked to fear of presenting and public speaking; underneath social anxiety is fear of being judged; you please others at the cost of discounting yourself because of fear of being abandoned and hypochondria can be related to fear of death. The list of fears that underlies surface issues is endless.
Often fear and anxiety hold a person back from living an authentic and fulfilled life. I am reminded of a couple of clients that I worked with in the past. They both lived with and were held back by their respective fears. One suffered from fear of flying and the other from fear of small confined spaces. At some point an opportunity presented itself to each of them that meant getting on a plane and flying to an exotic location. They had the possibility to do something that they strongly desired and dreamed of but the fear formed a big obstacle in their way. However, their desire to live out the dream finally motivated them and gave them enough leverage to work on their fears and make a change. These were stories with happy endings.
“Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood. Now is the time to understand more, so that we may fear less.”
— Marie Curie, physicist who conducted pioneering research on radioactivity
Fear and anxiety can sometimes be so strong and paralysing that the person experiencing them can end up feeling confused and unable to perform simple tasks. One client I am supporting right now during these difficult times told me that they no longer recognise themselves, and so instead of reaching out to others for help, they shy away and isolate themselves, because of shame and embarrassment at letting others see who they have become. This isolation can take a person from being fearful and anxious to experiencing full-scale depression and even becoming suicidal. It can also put a great strain on their relationships. In such situations, conversations with a professional may be necessary and even life-saving.
“Knowing is not enough. We must apply. Willing is not enough. We must do.”
― Bruce Lee, actor, martial artist and philosopher
How proactive are you when it comes to your relationship with yourself and your relationships with others? Being proactive is now more important than ever before. Take action and check regularly on family members, friends or neighbours and ask how they are feeling. Do the same for yourself and monitor your thoughts and feelings frequently. Listen to yourself and others with compassion rather than judgment. If you deem it necessary then do reach out to a professional or advise others to take that necessary step. It might seem like a small and insignificant action to you, but it could mean the world to someone who is feeling alone and hopeless. Connection now is more important than ever and it can save lives.
According to Bessel Van Der Kolk, a world-leading expert on traumatic stress and author of The Body Keeps The Score, being able to feel safe with other people is the single most important factor for maintaining mental health. He also said that numerous studies of disaster response around the globe have shown that social support is the most powerful protection against becoming overwhelmed by stress and trauma. We are unable now to be there for each other physically, however we can still provide a lot of social support from a distance.
“How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world.” – Anne Frank, a diarist and a victim of the Holocaust
