By BIS Contributor Debbie Lane
It was a beautiful day…bright sunshine after days of dreary, overcast skies and cold temperatures. The air was fresh and warm (in the 70s) and wonderful! A great reprieve right in the middle of winter.
I was taking a walk to enjoy the incredible weather, after being cooped up inside for days. It was intoxicating—being outside as the sun sparkled in the blue sky and the warm breeze brushed my face—but then my mind started wandering (and wondering)…
Oh my! That guy coming towards me looks like a homeless person—what is my plan if he approaches me for money…or worse?!
Better walk straight so I don’t get hit by a bicycle rider—remember that girl that was killed on this very trail when a bike ran her over a couple of year ago?!
What if that German Shepherd over there gets lose and attacks me— remember when I was attacked on a school yard in grade school by a lose German Shepherd?
I’m in a deserted part of the trail, woods on either side—what if a burglar jumps out and attacks me—there were some reported 6 months ago, robbing walkers of their cell phones?!
And on and on my mind went! Then…I thought…WHAT AM I DOING?! I am ruining this perfectly wonderful walk with my fear-filled/negative thoughts that have no basis in reality.
Merriam Webster defines fear as “an unpleasant often strong emotion caused by anticipation or awareness of danger and/or anxious concern” and unwarranted as “without a basis in reason or fact.” If we combine those two, you have something like: Anxious concern without a basis in reason or fact (that I’m calling “unwarranted fear”)
I don’t know about you, but I recently realized that I spend a lot of my days like that— fearing things that I shouldn’t fear because they are unwarranted. There are a lot of things we fear…and just in case we can’t think of anything in the moment to fear, social media, the news and television are there to give us ideas.
According to a 2016 study by the Chapman University of what Americans fear, the top 10 fears are:
- Corruption of government officials (same top fear as 2015) — 60.6%
- Terrorist attacks — 41%
- Not having enough money for the future — 39.9%
- Being a victim of terror — 38.5%
- Government restrictions on firearms and ammunition — 38.5%
- People I love dying — 38.1%
- Economic or financial collapse — 37.5%
- Identity theft — 37.1%
- People I love becoming seriously ill — 35.9%
- The Affordable Health Care Act/”Obamacare” — 35.5%
These are only the top ten—there are lots more. You may want to take a look at the entire list because you’ll probably recognize many as old friends (that you need to un-friend).
So, what do we do to quit living in unwarranted fear so that we can enjoy life fully?
I was stymied with how to answer that question and then four things happened:
- My seemingly healthy mom had a massive brain hemorrhage and as I sat quietly with her for 5 days while she was in a hospice facility in a coma, I learned a lot. As her body slowly starting shutting down, the nurses would come in frequently, observe my mom closely and then tell me exactly what was happening. They said my mom’s mind/brain were trying different things to help the body survive—i.e. changing her breathing patterns, changing her body temperature in different body parts (one part would be hot and one part would be cold). The nurses told me that the brain/mind’s job is to protect the body—and every physical change we saw was the brain/mind doing its job. The doctor told us that a few of his previous patients had come out of comas and could recite verbatim every conversation that had happened in the room with them—indicating that even though their body appeared to be unconscious, their brain/mind was functioning and present.
- I read an article “4 Ways to Tame Your Negativity Bias” where I learned that that humans are hard-wired for danger and that “this negativity bias served (…) humans thousands of years ago, helping us respond to imminent threats, like a dangerous animal (…) a person who ignored danger (…) even once may have ended up maimed or dead.” While we don’t live in a caveman world any longer, our brain may still react “disproportionately to those things we perceive as ‘negative’.”
- I attended one of T. Harv Eker’s online courses “Don’t Believe A Thought You Think”, which reinforced the above concepts by explaining that our minds are “survival mechanisms” whose main job is protection. Our mind is always looking for the bad and ignoring the good because the good can’t hurt us. Your mind is NOT you. So, how do you tame your mind and train it to work for you? The short answer is “4 Magic Words”—tell your mind “Thank You For Sharing” and then “choose a new improved/empowered thought to replace it with.” While this sounds simple, it is not easy and I highly recommend you attend T. Harv Eker’s 70-minute, online course “Don’t Believe A Thought You Think” for a more in-depth explanation.
- I started re-reading two books on my bookshelf by Joyce Meyer, where I recognized many of my thought patterns that were resulting in what Joyce described as a:
- wondering mind (i.e. wondering what is going to happen)
- wandering mind (the inability to concentrate)
- sense of impending doom, or evil forebodings
- confused mind (Joyce says reasoning leads to confusion – where we try to figure something out that is unfathomable, but our mind just won’t let it go)
It’s amazing how all these incredible “answers” came to me in a short timeframe and that they reinforced the same message about the role the mind/brain plays that puts us in a constant state of unwarranted fear! The key message in all of them is that your mind/brain has one job—which is to keep you alive.
I fully believe being aware of something is the first step to fixing it.
Since our brains/minds are wired to keep us alive, we will need to be diligent and put a plan in place to change our thinking patterns as we face situations that are not life-threatening. I find it extremely empowering to realize I DON’T have to live in fear and negative thinking any longer. So, I choose to replace all the unwarranted negative thinking / fear with positive, truthful thoughts…and I hope you’ll do the same. Those negative thoughts/unwarranted fears are not helping any of us!
“America’s Top Fears 2016: Chapman University Survey of American Fears.” Chapman University Wilkinson College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences, October 11, 2016
Qizilbash, Anis. “4 Ways to Tame Your Negativity Bias.” Entrepreneur, July 25, 2016
Meyer, Joyce. Battlefield of the mind: Winning the Battle in Your Mind. FaithWords, 1995.
Meyer, Joyce. Power Thoughts: 12 Strategies to Win the Battle of the Mind. FaithWords, 2010.
