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A quick thread about courage.
Courage isn't fearlessness. You can be fearless simply if you don't know that there's danger. Courage is overcoming your fear.
So by that logic, the more fearful you are, the more courageous you can be!
Courage isn't fearlessness. You can be fearless simply if you don't know that there's danger. Courage is overcoming your fear.
So by that logic, the more fearful you are, the more courageous you can be!
Welcome to the magical exercise of flipping a maladaptive belief right on its head to reveal its adaptive counterpart.
"I could never be brave like that, I'm too fearful."
No, no. In fact, you're blessed with the opportunity to be courageous every single day.
"I could never be brave like that, I'm too fearful."
No, no. In fact, you're blessed with the opportunity to be courageous every single day.
Which also means having to expend the emotional energy of overcoming your fear over the smallest stressors, I feel that. But that expenditure has a return on investment. The emotional expenditure of feeling fearful all the time does not.
And here's an important thing to remember:
Avoidance strengthens fear.
Every time you look at that molehill and disengage from it, your fear response goes "see? Scary!", and it grows a little, until it becomes a mountain.
Avoidance strengthens fear.
Every time you look at that molehill and disengage from it, your fear response goes "see? Scary!", and it grows a little, until it becomes a mountain.
Then when you do challenge it, your fear response is forced to engage with the reality of the situation, and it turns out that mountain is a molehill after all.
This is what psyching yourself out is. And the antidote to this, to overcome the magnitude of your fear, is courage.
This is what psyching yourself out is. And the antidote to this, to overcome the magnitude of your fear, is courage.
Call it a leap of faith, call it bravery, call it courage. Ultimately, what it is, is taking a step forward and trusting that the ground will be there under your feet when you do.
The more fearful you are, the more courageous you can be.
The more fearful you are, the more courageous you can be.
That's not to say you should make yourself afraid, that would be psyching yourself out. It's simply to say, to whoever needs to hear this today, to not be discouraged by your fears. Be encouraged by them.
With love, Kirsten "worrywart supreme" de Wolf
With love, Kirsten "worrywart supreme" de Wolf
