Christine Hernandez is the Mental Performace coach for TEC. She’s worked with thousands of individuals to help them develop the mental and emotional tools to conquer their fears and reach their full potential. Schedule your free coaching session with her today!
A few years ago after almost losing my life to a brain injury/terminal condition, I found myself declaring that I have anxiety, I saw myself as an anxious person. I was living in fear all the time! I was afraid that it would happen again if I pushed my limits and found myself living in a shell of who I once was! Someone asked me if you weren’t fearful and anxious who would you be? This question blew my mind. It took me almost a week to come up with an answer! I later told my colleague I am a confident, excited leader.
From there I tried to stop looking at myself and saying to myself and others that I was anxious. I started to shift the story and to my surprise, my life followed! Over the past almost decade I have studied the brain and how we can take back control over our lives! What I have found is anxiety is a part of the human experience and the reality is that we do not have to be victim to it!
With the right tools, we can learn our unique process and learn how to use anxiety for us instead of allowing it to work against us! One exercise I have found is really helpful is identifying the lie we are believing. It is typically helpful to look at the “identity lie”. For example, when you are stressed about a situation ask yourself what am I making this situation mean about me? This will be an “I” statement. Then there are 3 questions we can follow this with:
- What is the negative impact this belief/lie has on my life?
- What is the benefit I get out of believing this lie?
- What is it costing you to continue to believe these lies?
(The human brain does not do anything without some sort of benefit. In this case, it is a “twisted” benefit. For example, I get to avoid rejection, stay safe by playing small, work hard, etc.)
(This will be all the things you want or desire in life. Allow your brain to see that there is more than the benefit.) Once you have that information it is time to change the story! Think of a high point in life and why that is your high point. (To find your why you can ask yourself the same question “What did I make that situation mean about me? This is an “I” statement.) Then ask yourself this set of questions.
- What is the truth about this situation based on my high why?
- What is the positive impact that truth has on my life, training, etc.?
- What is the positive impact that truth has on the world?
- Who would I be, what would I have and what would I do if I was living from this truth?
This set of questions helps the brain and the body visualize many aspects of what the truth looks like, feels like, and the impact it has on all aspects of your life. The goal is to create safety in the truth. As the brain feels safe it creates new neural pathways and stops living from the limiting beliefs that have been created.
THEN, take that truth and meditate on it! Write it down, put it in front of you while training, and say it over and over while training or before doing things that used to cause you anxiety. Declare it over yourself in your mind. The more we meditate on it and go find information to support the truth the wider the new neural pathways get. The less you use the old pathways the smaller they get. With this practice, you will find yourself slowly living free from fear.
It might continue to come up as you grow and take on new risks but you will be able to shift the internal dialogue. If you have questions please let me know I am happy to help! Or post other excises and tools! The last thing I will encourage us all to think about is letting go of the narrative that we are anxious individuals. The day I saw myself as more than my anxiety is the day it stopped having control over my life!
