A new book entitled “The Upside of Your Dark Side“, talks about how our “negative” emotions have positive sides. By understanding this we can take what are considered “bad” feelings and see them in a different light. Embracing all emotions, even the dark ones, allows us to live a whole life. If we are only chasing the “good” feelings, then we are missing out the complete emotional package of life.
Fear actually serves many positive roles. It puts you at a heightened state of awareness. You pay more attention. It helps you protect yourself and others. It causes you to put in extra effort. Fear is there for many good reason, provided you are able to recognize when it has gone to far. Just like one can have too much of a good thing, you can also overdo fear and other “negative” emotions.
Of all the emotions that we generally try to avoid, fear can have the farthest reaching effects on my life. It’s a powerful emotion. At work, if I have a challenging arbitration or trial, I experience fear. When I’m trying something new, I can feel my blood pressure rise. When I have a new presentation to give, anxiety and doubt can set in.
I can contain small amounts of fear and keep it localized to the specific cause. But, when I hit a heightened sense of fear, it seeps out into virtually every aspect of my life. Relationships and situations that were fine yesterday are filled with questions and doubts today.
This higher level of fear changes everything in my sight. Like the mirrors that distorts what we look like at a House of Mirrors, nothing seems right. What is perfectly fine does not appear so. What someone says to me gets mangled into something it’s not. No matter how hard they try to explain what they are saying, I can’t hear it. Have you ever experienced that? It’s strange and disconcerting.
The biggest problem for me with a higher level of fear is contraction. My world shrinks and everyone and every thing with it. Positive experiences no longer hold joy. No one really does enough. My skills and ability seem to be wrapped in Kryptonite. It’s one of my least favorite mental states. When I recognize someone is in that place, the last thing I need to do is tell them they are wrong and to snap out of it.
When I hit this heightened sense of fear whats most important is recognizing it’s happening. I try not to make critical decisions. I’m careful not to get into important conversations. Nothing good comes from this state of being. The best I can hope for is that I’ve not created too big of a mess to clean up.
Once I’ve recognized I’m in this state, I have to bring my mind back into balance. To much fear makes me feel alone and situations become unsolvable. I start by reconnecting with feelings of love, caring and relationships. In the heightened state of fear, these feelings and experiences are dampened.
The more often I’m acting out of a place of fear, the less I am. It not only takes away from me, but from all important relationships. When I’m working with a client who is functioning from a place of fear, my job becomes to help them move out of that state, not state facts over and over expecting them to hear it differently.
What are your fear triggers? What does your heightened state of fear look like and feel like? What helps you recognize you are in that place? Most importantly, what helps you move out of that state of being?
Denying fear does not make it go away. Recognizing fear for how it helps you and, equally when it becomes irrational and disproportionate, allows you to more fully function in a world often full of swirling emotions.
Interesting and a great read. Fear is a common emotion in lawyering but few will admit it.