Reframing Fear

But is what you're feeling in that situation, in those situations, is that really fear? When you want to make a change in your life, you want to do something different. You want to show up in a way that people haven't seen you show up before. You want to quit your job and do something completely different. You want to start a side hustle alongside what you're doing. You want to quit drinking, you know, you want to start going to the gym. Whatever change it is that you're trying to make, you're changing how people see you. And that change can induce those feelings. What will people think? What will people say? What if this doesn't work out? But again, the question is, is what you're feeling fear? Now? I say no. You're listening to the Circle C Project. Welcome to the Triple CE Project, the podcast that helps gain clarity, boost confidence, build courage, so you can live lifeless. I'm your host, Ryan Spence, the big lord, dropout, life coach, author, speaker, lover of hoodies, hip hop and big, hairy, audacious goals. If you're tired of living the life you think you should want and ready to start living the life you do want, this podcast will help you get from where you are to where you really want to be. So now with friends, I invite you to grab a drink, take a seat, and allow me to guide you towards living a life that's lit. Hey. Hey. Welcome to episode 33 of the Triple C Project with me, your host, Ryan Spence. How's it going, people? What is new? What's going on with me this week? I went to a TEDx event, first event I've been to. I'm a big fan of TED Talks, watched videos online, like I'm sure many of you have. And I'm also, as I mentioned before, in the process of preparing my own TED Talk and applying to events. Actually applied for three at the moment. It's all very exciting. So hoping, hoping someone will take me for an event in the new year in 2023, but going to an event, I'd never been to an event and so I went to TEDx Wolverhampton, which is Wolverhampton's about 90 minutes south of where I live here in the UK. And it was a great event. It was really interesting, kind of being there for the whole day as opposed to just seeing individual talks. It was a really well run event. You know, there was a good number of people there, but it wasn't too big. All the speakers, 12 speaks in all, were all really amazing, inspiring, had really great personal stories that they shared and really Kind of, you know, made you think. The whole purpose of ted, the whole tagline, is ideas worth spreading. And each of the speakers had a great idea that was definitely worth spreading. And the really good thing was that they had a Q and A with the speakers at the end as well, which, again, is something that obviously you don't get when you're watching talks. So that was great. I had a really, really great time. And why am I telling you about this? Well, it's kind of leads into what I want to talk about in today's episode, public speaking. Giving a TED Talk, giving a presentation at work, whatever it may be, is something that induces fear in people. I know, I have been there. And it's something that sometimes people want to do but just don't do, or it takes them a lot to really work through. And so today I want to talk about the idea of fear. But before I do that, obviously one of the three C's in the Triple C project is courage. And I want to start with a definition of what courage is. And this definition is taken from Merriam Webster. You can also find it in chapter seven of my book, the Triple C Method. And courage is defined as having mental or moral strength to venture, persevere, and withstand danger, fear or difficulty. Okay? To withstand the mental and moral strength to venture, persevere and withstand danger, fear or difficulty. And so thinking of public speaking or thinking of anything else, I want to talk about fear, and I want to sort of focus in on the fear aspect of that definition. When we talk about courage now, we talk a lot about fear. I talk a lot about fear. The whole personal development world talks a lot about fear and fear in different aspects. Fear of failure, fear of embarrassment, fear of other people's opinions. All of these fears that come up when we start to think about or start to initiate change, change in our own lives, when we start to grow, when people start to see us think differently, walk differently, dress differently, as we become more of who we are and sort of step more into the person that we want to be. But fear, well, is what we're really experiencing in those scenarios. Fear, I guess, is my question now before you all gun for me and say, of course it is. I really feel this, and this is fear, and I'm really scared. I'm not talking about this to minimize your feelings and your emotions. Your feelings are real. You know, we have to feel the feelings that we feel, and we have to recognize what we're feeling and not just gloss over them, as I've talked about. Before, but just because what we feel, we think is something, does it, Is it really that? What I mean is if we, what we're feeling, we identify is, and we think of as fear, is it really fear or is it something else? So to answer that question, we have to kind of get to, well, what is fear? And again, I come to a couple of definitions. So again, Merriam Webster, I don't know why it seems to be the, the online dictionary of choice that I go to when I take definitions and start to break them down as I talk about in my book, but that's what I'm going to use. So what is fear? Fear is an unpleasant, often strong emotion caused by anticipation or awareness of danger. Okay, so taking that definition, in order for there to be fear, there has to be danger. That danger can be anticipation of danger and awareness of danger. But there has to be danger in order for there to be fear. So the most obvious question then is, what is danger? And again we go to my old friend Merriam Webster and two definitions of danger here or two aspects of danger. One, danger is involving possible injury, pain, harm or loss, or able or likely to inflict injury or harm. So that's what danger is. So fear is an anticipation or an awareness of danger. For there to be danger, there has to be the possibility of injury, pain or harm. So, or what you're going to do, the action that you're going to take has to be likely to inflict injury or harm upon you. Okay, so we defined what fear is and we've defined what danger is. Now if we look at really what fear is, if we think back to prehistoric times, let's take one of the fears, let's take fear of other people's opinions. We want to, we want to, we care what people say about us, you know, and that stems from these prehistoric times because back in the days, you know, way before my time, in your time, we lived in tribes and we needed to keep together to keep safe. And if people didn't like us, you know, we could be banished from the tribe and be left to fend for ourselves in the wild. And being out alone in the wild, among the animals, among the, the wilderness, among the unknown, was likely to lead to death. So that's where that stems from. And I talk about, in the book Coming Back to Fear, I talk about this aspect, but also talk about a more personal aspect of fear. So I talk about when I crashed my car into the Central Reservation on a, on a motorway, on a freeway. In that moment, I experienced fear because There was an awareness of danger. I'd crashed my car at fairly high speed, and in doing that, there was the possibility of injury, pain, harm, or loss, either to me or to somebody else. Unfortunately, there was no one else around. Fortunately, neither of us in the car were injured, at least not seriously. We were shaking up, but there was no injury. But what I felt in that moment when I realized what had happened, was fear. It meets that definition of fear now, something like sharing content on social media, recording this podcast, or standing up for yourself and having a difficult conversation with somebody. Those things may induce the same feelings that I had when I crashed my car. Those feelings where your heart's beating really fast, the adrenaline's pumping, your palms are sweaty, you're nervous about what's going to happen next. Those feelings may be the same, but is what you're feeling in that situation, in those situations, is that really fear? When you want to make a change in your life, you want to do something different. You want to show up in a way that people haven't seen you show up before. You want to quit your job and do something completely different. You want to start a side hustle alongside what you're doing. You want to quit drinking. You know, I mean, you want to start going to the gym. Whatever change it is that you're trying to make, you're changing how people see you. And that change can induce those feelings. What will people think? What will people say, what if this doesn't work out? But again, the question is, is what you're feeling fear? Now, I say, no, it's not. Because if we go back to what the definitions of fear, the definition of fear is anticipation or awareness of danger. And then if we go back to what danger is, including involving possible injury, pain, harm or loss, none of those things that we've talked about, sharing content, recording podcast, changing your job, going to the gym. You know, I mean, dressing differently, having a difficult conversation is going to cause. It's going to put you in danger. It's going to lead to possible injury, pain, harm, or loss. Really, if you think about it, you can. I'm sure if you really wanted to be nitpicky, you could go into, well, there's degrees of harm and there's degrees of loss. We ain't doing that here. This isn't what happens, okay, you're not feeling that. So therefore I say that in those situations, what you're not, you're not feeling fear. So if you're having these very real emotions, these very real physical reactions to the thing that you're going to do or about to do. And if that isn't fear, then what is it? Well, I say it's discomfort. That's what it is. I recognize those feelings, you know, I mean, the feelings which I also have, and I recognize that they're real. But the distinction that I'm trying to make here is that they're not. That's not fear, it's discomfort. So what's the difference? What's the difference between fear and discomfort? We're going to come to that right after this. Hey, I'm interrupting myself to give you this short message. Now, if you're listening to this pod, you're likely looking to change your life. Here's the thing. Transformation doesn't happen by doing what you've always done. It happens when you change your thoughts about what's possible for you. My book, the Triple C Method helps you do that by giving you the tools and strategies to stop living a life of lethargy and start living life lit, described as a transformational toolkit, and the book I wish I'd had when I decided to leave corporate. The Triple C method will change how you see yourself and how you live your life. Available now as paperback, ebook and audiobook read by yours truly. Head to iamryspence.com book or over to your favorite bookseller to grab your copy today so you can stop living a life of lethargy and start living life next. So fear, discomfort is what you're feeling fear, is it discomfort? How do you know? What's the difference? So imagine this. You know, I would say that discomfort is uncomfortable, but it's not life threatening. It's not going to render you seriously injured or dead. Simple as that. That's the simplest explanation. Let's just take an example. Say you're walking along the street or walking through a field and there's a rusty nail. And you step on that rusty nail, that may induce fear. Because stepping on a rusty male with your. On your shoe could go through your shoe, could go into your foot. It could cause serious damage to your foot. It could lead to tetanus. You know, I mean, there's all of these ramifications that could happen from stepping on that rusty nail or from having that nail stuck in the bottom of your shoe. So if that happens and you get that sharp intake of breath and you get those feelings of that fast beating heart, the sweaty palm, the nervousness, I would say that that's, that's fear, rightly, because there's potential danger there. However, if you're walking down the street and you know when you're walking and sometimes you get that annoying little stone in your shoe and you're trying to walk and you can kind of feel it and it's a little bit uncomfortable and you can't really plant your foot properly. That's discomfort. You know, that stone in your shoe is uncomfortable, but it's not putting you in danger. It's not going to cause you serious harm and injury. And at some point when it's appropriate to do so, you can start, take off your shoe, shake the stone out, put your shoe back on, and off you go, continue as normal. So that's what I would say is the difference. There's lots of other examples that you can. You can take, but one, in one scenario, there's potential danger, it could lead to your loss of life, it could lead to serious injury. And in another, it's just uncomfortable, a little bit annoying, a little bit frustrating, but you're not going to die from it. So how do you know if what you're experiencing is fear or discomfort? Well, I've kind of just said a bit about it there, but I'm going to share with you my fear checklist. And this checklist is interesting because it actually came about when I had a hypnotherapy session and it was there in my subconscious and it just came out and I was like, oh, wow, this is actually pretty good. So I'm going to share it with you today. When you're faced with change, when you're faced with taking a step towards what it is that you want, when you're faced towards doing something new, running through this checklist. No. Experience the feelings that you're feeling and then run it through this checklist. So, first question, will this kill me? If the answer is yes, then it's fear. If the answer is no, ask yourself the next question. Will this lead to injury, pain, harm, loss? For me or for somebody else? If the answer is yes, again, what you're experiencing is fear. If the answer is no, what you're experiencing is discomfort. And so then if you recognize that what you're experiencing is discomfort, no matter how severe the symptoms are, then you've got to ask yourself, is the discomfort worth it? Is it worth going through that discomfort, doing the thing to get to the other side? What's on the other side of that discomfort? Because when you know that, you can decide whether it's worth going through, there's no point pushing through for the sake of pushing through because you think that you should do something. I mean, that's just. That's not even discomfort. I'd say that's suffering, you know, I mean, you're. You're suffering through something just because you feel I really, really must do that. You're shutting all over yourself. And I've been guilty of that. But now, when I first left big, or when I first became a coach, in fact, and I was sort of following the coaches of the programs, and they were, this is how you do this and this is how you do that. And I was trying to kind of still force myself into following a pathway that just didn't feel right for me. And I was like, actually, no, this isn't. This isn't just uncomfortable. It's actually because it doesn't work for me, you know, I mean, it's not worth it. It's not worth me going through this discomfort of doing things that I don't want to do, because it's just not me. So I decided not to do it. And this is the dialogue you can have with yourself when you recognize that what you're experiencing is discomfort. It's whether the discomfort is worth it. And if it is, then push through, figure out a way to keep going. And if it's not, don't do it. And going back up the chest list, if it is fear, does it mean that you shouldn't do the thing? Well, not necessarily. Because again, you can ask yourself the same question. Is the fear worth it? You know me, Is the. Is the potential of what could happen? Is the danger of what could happen worth it? And you see people do this all the time. These people go on these expeditions climbing mountains, I mean, really grueling ultra racers through the deserts, those sorts of things, which, yeah, the possibility is that they could end up in serious injury or death, and sometimes they do. But then the question you still have to ask yourself is, but is it worth it? Is what I can potentially gain on the other side of that fear, is it. Is it worth it? Not to anybody else, but to you. And this comes back to identifying why you're doing the thing or why you want the thing. Because knowing that will then make it easy to answer the questions, whether it's in relation to the fear or whether it's in relation to the discomfort. And look, the thing is, if you decide that it is worth it, then it doesn't mean that you still have to suffer, because there are ways that you can get to where you want to get to encourage stacking. Curry stacking is one of the processes that I use. I shared the process of care stacking with you in an earlier episode. And you can also find it a bit about it in, in the book as well. The Triple C method, Courage stacking is going to help you temper that discomfort so that the discomfort doesn't lead to you being overwhelmed. But you can use that discomfort to fuel you, to spur you on, and it will help you get to the other side because you'll be clear on what's on the other side. And that experience and the discomfort to get to that is worth it. So hopefully this episode has helped you think about fear a little bit differently, helped you to reframe fear fear. And I'd like you to take this episode with you. And the next time you come up against something which is scary, I mean, where you start to feel those feelings, the adrenaline starts to rush through your body. You start to get those sweaty palms and that nervousness, that anxiety, I want you to run that, run the thing that you're thinking of doing or the thing that's inducing that through that checklist and figure out is it fear or is it discomfort? And whichever it is, then work through the process of is it worth it? Not for anybody else, not because you feel that you should do it anyway, but is it worth it for you? How will pushing through that fear or that discomfort serve you? What's on the other side? What's going to help you live your life better? Live your life in the way that you want, create that life that's lit. And once you know that, then you can start to utilize the process to make that happen. And courage stacking is a great way of doing that. And if you haven't used the process of courage stacking, because look, I know how many books have you read which have given you great tools and strategies, but then you got really inspired, but they never actually gone on and done the work and implemented the habits and the strategies in your own life. I know I've done that many, many times. And I know people have done it with my book. I know people have read the book, got really inspired, but they're not got the workbook, not done the work. And they're probably still doing the same things that they've always been doing. And look, I get it, no judgment, no shade, but I want to help with that. So this is why I will be running a new course just for you, five days, and it's called Triple C 101. Triple C 101 is basically going to take you through the Triple C method. Very simple. Very straightforward. I'm going to take you through process of how to gain clarity, how to boost confidence, and how to build courage. I'm going to be running this live. So it's not going to be some passive program that you get, you buy, you download, and then you never use again. I'm going to be running it live. And here's the thing, it's going to take you no more than 30 minutes a day to turn up. Watch the live, and then you can go ahead and do the work in your own time. However long that takes you. It's going to be over the course of one week. It's going to be five days. And the added benefit of it is that as well as me sharing the lesson with you each day live, which should only be 10 to 15 minutes, so very short. Then going to stick around and give you some coaching. So if you want to be coached on anything within that lesson from this podcast, within the book, I'm going to stick around and be there to coach you in that group session. And even if you're not the one being coached, you'll be able to watch that and get the benefit of that, too. So, look, it's. It's a pretty. It's going to be pretty fucking good, okay? I'm telling you that right now. So if this sounds like something which is going to really help you take some of the things which you've already learned and heard about, but actually start to implement them, then you're going to want to be a part of the inaugural Triple C101 live. So to do that, send me an email. Hey, at iamryanspence.com put Triple C101 live in the subject line and just say I want in and I'll send you the details. Or you can do the same on Instagram, LinkedIn. Wherever you find me, come ahead, join the party. It's going to be great. It's going to be running sometime later in October, More details to follow. And yeah, it's going to be a lot of fun. So triple C101 live, it's going to help you gain clarity, boost confidence and build courage so you can live life lit, actionable, practicable, lots of fun. And yeah, let's make it happen. Let's get you moving forward as we start to roll towards the end of the year. Let's do the work, let's make it happen, and let's get you to stop living a life of lethargy. And you know the drill. Start living life lit. Thanks for tuning in. But before you go, the weight of limiting beliefs is heavy. It literally weighs you down and keeps you stuck in that life of lethargy. I know. It's why I stayed in Big Law for so long. And it's why so many of my clients don't believe they can do the things that they want to do. But what causes those limiting beliefs? It's a lack of confidence. Lack of confidence in the belief that you can do the things that you want to do. And I got something for that. It's my confidence journal. It's six journal prompts that I created that I've used to help me get from where I am to where I want to be. To help to give me the belief to do the things that seem outside of my control, outside of what I can do. If this sounds like you, you need to get your hands on the journal. Best thing about it, it's free. All you have to do is head to Iamry Spence.com hit the button and confidence journal and get your copy today. It's going to help you start to reframe your thoughts and get you thinking about what you can do instead of focusing on what you can't do and shed that load of limiting beliefs that you don't need to be carrying. See you again next week. And until that time, stop living a life of lethargy and start living life lit.