Learn Workbook
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
LEARN THE WORKBOOK M THISGIRLISONFIRE.COM 2 STAGE 2: LEARN Congratulations! Well done on completing Stage 1 of this course, and taking a huge step away from feeling stuck, scared, and like you’re just existing rather than truly living. Now that you are in Stage 2 I know you’re feeling nervously excited, ready to change, committed, engaged and really believing that you CAN change. I am so fired up, knowing what’s in store for you over the next few parts! You are going to be making HUGE strides towards breaking the fear that is holding you back, learning to understand it, control it and shut down that inner voice that tells you “you can’t”. I’m here to show you that YOU CAN! Once again… take your time with this, don’t rush through it, ticking things off and diving on to the next thing. You’re going to be working through some uncomfortable things here, so take as long as you need to, there is no time scale and this will always be here for you. This is the part where you let it go to grow. By the time you finish this SECOND STAGE of the course, you will have learned how to: Cope with fear when it happens - because it WILL happen. Deal with “What’s the worst that could happen? Figure out if your fears are real, or if your brain is simply gossiping with you and freaking you out. Keep your emotions appropriate to your situation, and not blow them out of control. See things as they really are not as you see them. Choose to think differently. Learn from problems, not get swamped by them. Live up to your eulogy. Reframe your ‘failures’ M THISGIRLISONFIRE.COM 3 STAGE 2: LEARN Now you are ready to start this, remember to go to your profile and change your Stage from LIVE to LEARN. That way you will easily see and connect with other members who are at the same stage as you, share your experiences and support each other. For more inspiring tunes to help get you in the mood, head to our FREE PLAYLIST on Spotify and head to LEARN. DDeep down, we know that fear stops us from doing certain things. Geenerally, that’s a good thing because otherwise we’d be leaping off cliffsfs and believing we can jump over speeding cars. Fear is in our brain to protectr us – either from ourselves and our own stupidity or from the dangers of the world in which we live. One thing you need to realise is that you’re going to get it wrong many, many times. NNo one gets what they want in life – at work, at home or wherever – without falling flat on their face, looking and feeling stupid, and having to pick themselves up, brush themselves down, and start all over again. TThehe ttimesimes yyouou ggetet tthingshings wwrongrong aaren’tren’t ffailures,ailures, tthey’rehey’re jjustust aattttempts.empts. TTheyhey tteacheach yyouou ssomethingomething bbecauseecause tthehe nnextext ttimeime yyouou ttry,ry, yyou’llou’ll ddoo iitt ddifferently.ifferently. Next time, you’ll do it another way. And if that fails, you’ll try it another way and another and another until it finally works. Remember, Einstein didn’t wake up one morning, discover the theory of relativity before lunch and then receive the Nobel Prize for Physics by teatime. Success in any form takes time and effort. BBesides,esides, iiff yyouou ddon’ton’t ggetet tthingshings wwrong,rong, hhowow wwillill yyouou kknownow wwhenhen yyou’reou’re rright?ight? M THISGIRLISONFIRE.COM 4 THE FEAR FACTOR... r Pa t 1. You are afraid of disappointing those you love and who love you WWho is it that you are afraid of disappointing? Dig deep here and be hhonest.o Is it your partner, your friends, colleagues, yourself or your parents?n Why is this? Was there a time when you did something that was not mmet with approval and it both stung and stuck with you? Is that what you are revisiting every time you think of trying? M THISGIRLISONFIRE.COM THE FEAR FACTOR... 5 r Pa t 2: You want to avoid feeling scared A lot of the time we’re doing whatever we can to avoid feeling scared. That’s completely understandable, but consider this: if fear is stopping you from living the life you really want, you’re just waiting for it all to end. You’re not thriving, let alone loving your life. What a waste! Can you think of a time when you have skirted around trying to do something, just because you knew it would frighten you, and you didn’t want to feel that feeling of fear? Why? Really unpick this; where has this fear come from? What can you practically do to overcome it? M THISGIRLISONFIRE.COM THE FEAR FACTOR... r 6 Pa t 3. You don’t think you deserve to succeed. Somewhere along the way, it’s been dripped into us that we don’t deserve to do well. Whether that’s come from a parent, a teacher at school, a spouse, a friend, at some point it’s clicked into our brain and stayed there: You don’t deserve this. Get back into your box and stay quiet. You’re not smart enough. You’re not pretty enough. You’re not capable enough. Stop showing off. Whatever the voice is saying, it all comes down to the same thing: you don’t deserve it. Somehow, we’ve taken that voice and swapped the ‘you’ for ‘I’. This difference is really important to understand. You didn’t start off in life thinking that you couldn’t do something or that you didn’t deserve it, or that maybe you shouldn’t try because someone else might not like it. That came later. This is a difficult part of our psyche to overcome, and it won’t happen just because you jot a few things down today. But it will make you see that just because you have been told it, doesn’t mean it’s true. Write down times in your life where someone has said these things to you, and made you feel unworthy, incompetent or undeserving. Who were they? Why do you think they said these things to you; what was the benefit to them? Seeing it written down is a big step towards separating the emotional pull of how awful it has made you feel, and seeing the reasoning behind their actions. MakingMaking yyouou ffeeleel ssmallmall iiss a wwayay ooff mmakingaking tthemhem ffeeleel mmoreore iinn ccontrol,ontrol, mmoreore ppowerful.owerful. IItt iiss aaboutbout tthem,hem, iitt iiss nnotot aaboutbout YYOOUU.. M THISGIRLISONFIRE.COM THE FEAR FACTOR... r 7 Pa t Well done for writing that down. It isn’t easy, and I hope it has helped you in some way to let the pain of those experiences go. M THISGIRLISONFIRE.COM THE FEAR FACTOR... 8 r Pa t To balance things out a little, now do this exercise: Write down a list of times where you have done something that has exceeded what you, or anyone else thought you were capable of. When did you surprise yourself by knocking it out the park, doing a great job, being brave? It doesn’t matter what it was; it can be as small as ringing to complain about something when you hate confrontation, or doing a project at work that had kept you up at night with fear but actually went really well. Anything! How great does it feel to see that you have already done the thing that you are most afraid of? Screw what they say! You are: “Braver than you believe, stronger than you seem and smarter than you think.” So says Winnie The Pooh. YouYou aarere aalsolso ddeservingeserving ooff iitt aall,ll, yyouou jjustust hhaven’taven’t hhadad tthehe rightright ppeopleeople ttellingelling yyouou sso…o… M THISGIRLISONFIRE.COM THE FEAR FACTOR... r 9 Pa t 4. You are scared of failing What’s failure? What’s success? Only you know the answer. You’re the one who sets your limitations, as well as your goals, no one else. It’s said that success is failure turned inside out, and it is, but it’s also much more than that. It’s also about perspective. We all need to learn how to cope with fear when it happens – because it WILL happen. If your fear is of failure, try to see each attempt at something as an opportunity to do it differently. If it doesn’t work you can of course have your emotional reaction first – cry, scream, shout, sulk, or whatever your go‐to response is – but then sit down and draw up a plan for how you’re going to try again. That’s the difference between people who fail and those who succeed: people who succeed, fail way more often than those who don’t, because they keep trying until they get to where they want to be. Recognise that some fear is normal, rational, or to be expected, and keep your emotions to the level demanded by the situation. Don’t make it into something it’s not. RRememberemember tthathat tthingshings aarere nneverever aass ttheyhey sseemeem – tthey’rehey’re aass wwee sseeee tthem.hem. CChoosehoose ttoo sseeee tthingshings ddifferently.ifferently. Think of a time when you have failed at something you tried, really toe-curlingly bombed. Horrible, wasn’t it? And yet, here you are. The world didn’t end, it just felt really, really bad for a while.