Fearing Less

Yesterday’s post I talked about trying to FAIL LESS; trying to mitigate the failure that we all experience with behaviors that breed success!  Today the thoughts on my mind have to do with FEARING LESS; seeing something new or different and not allowing your reaction to be dictated by fear.  Experiencing things on a different plane and not being completely thrown for a loop.

 

My handstand experiment is a good example for fearing less.  When I first dreamt up that I should learn how to do a handstand I thought it would be a walk in the park.  As long as I could support my body weight on my arms, I would just have to lock my elbows, kick my legs up and lean against the wall.  Done deal!  The trouble I ran into first wasn’t whether or not I could hold myself up, it was instantly experiencing the world from a different perspective.  That and the dog licking me in the face while I couldn’t defend myself.  But mostly the fact that everything was upside down and nothing felt familiar or natural.  Forget that it’s exactly the same body in exactly the same vertical plane, it’s a completely different experience, I may as well have been trying to breathe underwater.

 

So last night after making the declaration that I was going to try and progress to a handstand (supported or unsupported, I’m not sure yet), I took some hints from online and here’s what I ended up with.

 

I asked Ray to snap a picture so that later on I could compare what I started with to what I will end up with.  Looking back at the picture I was struck by how different it looked than to what I was actually experiencing.  First of all I was way less vertical than I thought I was.  I even scooched my hands back towards the couch a bit to see how that felt and I instantly felt like I was almost past vertical and would cantilever over onto the floor.  The picture shows that’s not even close to the position that I was in.  Experience (and feeling fear) vs reality.   

 

So then, moving on this morning, I saw a blog post about a girl who is going to practice her splits and when I saw that my first thought was “I can’t do that.”.  This morning though, I was reminded how fear can dictate your reaction and I wondered, why can’t I do that?  Sure, I cannot physically do it right this minute….but why can’t I work on it and eventually come to a place where I could do the splits?   Maybe, anatomically, I won’t be able to do it….but I sure as shit will NEVER be able to do it if I don’t at least try.

 

Fear is there when we don’t even know it’s there.  It’s not just that gut-sick feeling before you jump out of an airplane.  It’s quiet and insidious and it often will dictate our actions or reactions.   It’s there when we put others down, when we stop ourselves from making a change, from doing something different, from going against the grain (pun intended).

 

I challenge you, in whatever way you need to do it, put fear in its place, do something that scares you.  Skydive, headstand, toss the scale, wear red lipstick to work.

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