GTFU, Part Four: Confronting Your Emotional Energy Vampires & Fears
“Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate.”
-Carl Jung
This is the fourth in a series of Get the Fuck Unstuck© articles I've written based on a popular workshop I've been teaching for several years. (The first article can be found here.) The purpose of this series is to help you methodically uncover the things that are getting in the way of your creative and professional goals, and ultimately, to create a plan to move past them and on to the success you deserve.
The first two articles in the series were focused on time, helping you become better acquainted with the way you're spending your time and energy, and hopefully finding opportunities to pursue your goals. The third article moved from the exterior to the interior, focusing on the way your emotions, particularly fears about your creative work, can interfere with you achieving your goals.
This article takes that exploration one step further, offering a simple but very powerful approach to confronting those fears.
Over and over, in my workshops and working with coaching clients, I've seen this straightforward process get results. I've kept this article 'short but sweet', because I don't want to waste your time with details you don't need, but I encourage you to really dive into the exercise. It sounds simplistic, but dealing with fears can be overwhelming. It’s why so many folks avoid it. But the only way out is through!
Exercise: Confronting your Emotional Energy Vampires & Fears
Step One: Take out the free-writing page(s) of fears you created in the previous exercise, as well as a blank sheet of paper (or a new document). At the top of the new document, write: Fear Bullet Points
Step Two: Go through the free-writing page or pages and put them into bullet points / a list. Some people find it easiest to highlight fears from the first page and then copy onto the new list; others find this step unnecessary.
Example: your Free Write page might look like this:
I think I'm just stressed out about disappointing my family. Or looking bad in the eyes of family, especially my parents and my uncle. I can just hear them talking about law school and how I should've gone instead of this 'impossible Hollywood dream'. Or maybe even laughing behind my back. I worry about that with everyone. Friends included. My peers and friends, too.
That section might turn into a list like this:
• Fear of looking ridiculous. That people will laugh at me behind my back.
• Fear of disappointing my family (fear my family is right and I should have been a lawyer instead of a director)
Take your time, and be patient with yourself. I know this is a little awkward-- turning something very personal into what looks like an outline or shopping list. But that’s intentional!
Now we're going to confront each bullet point with logic and compassion. I call this the 'staring down' ritual. Instead of ignoring or running away from your fears, or pretending they don't exist, you'll look directly at each one, and challenge the thought with logic. Be kind to yourself as you go through them. Compassion will get you closer towards achieving your goals than beating yourself up.
Step Three: Take out a fresh sheet of paper, or open another document. Title this one: Stare-Down.
Re-write the first bullet point. Then think about it logically. Think about what evidence you have for the fear being true. If it helps, consider the feedback you'd give to a good friend who asked you about a fear. Write down the logical counter-argument to your fear in as much detail as feels right.
• Fear of looking ridiculous. That people will laugh at me behind my back.
The people I respect won’t; they haven't yet, and it’s extremely unlikely they’re going to start now.
Step Four: Repeat the process with each bullet point in turn. Take as long as you need to.
• Fear of disappointing my family (fear my family is right and I should have been a lawyer instead of a director)
This is what I want to do, and I've committed to trying it & making it work, at least for now. I'm not going to be a lawyer I'm an adult & deserve to have my choices respected. This is what I'm doing -- if my family is disappointed in that decision, that’s actually their problem, not mine.
• Fear that what I want to create won’t be original, that it’s been done before.
Someone has done it before? Well, the truth is, it’s ALL been done before. Nothing's totally original. Not Homer or Shakespeare. It’s all about my specific take on it. My unique perspective. No one else can do it exactly the way I can.
Step Five: You've completed the staring down process. Congratulations! If it's helpful, I encourage you to return to this exercise periodically. Become an expert at deeply understanding your own fears. Maybe over time you'll simplify and combine bullet points; or you'll create new ones as you uncover other fears you weren't aware of. Remember, knowledge is power, and the more you are able to look at your own fears, the less power they'll have to control you. (And if you still need more help with this, you may want to consider finding a great therapist.)
The Seminar
The content of this series of articles is drawn from one of my most popular worship series, Getting the F*CK Unstuck©. I'm excited to announce that, In August 2021, I'll be offering this workshop over Zoom for the first time. If you're interested, click here for more details. Have a look at my free e-book, Telling Your Story In 60 Seconds. And, if you think you'd benefit from one-on-one coaching with me, I'd love to connect with you. You can find more information on my private coaching packages here.