Fear is Toxic – Don’t Let it Poison Your Time

fear-cartoon-painting

Fear steals your time …

Fear. It’s the last thing you need. But how often does it creep into your thinking, distracting and undermining you?

On the other hand, don’t you love it when you feel energized, alert and confident?

Challenges feel workable, and  you transition easily from one task to the next. When you look back at the end of the day, you feel contentment and appreciation.

Fear – Seeing Clearly is the First Step

But then there are those days when nothing seems to go right. Instead of smoothly navigating sudden curves, your productivity sputters, maybe stalling out completely! You feel anxious, stuck, and isolated. Meanwhile, time flies by.

Try a first-class effectiveness tune-up! Start by noticing when fear is eating a hole in your day. The more keenly you look, the more examples you’re going to discover.

Here are 3 common situations, coupled with simple questions to help you regain control of your time.

Questions Help Quell Your Fear

Procrastination: “Maybe it will go away!”

It’s not logical, but deep inside, perhaps you hope you can sidestep this task. Unfortunately, the more you postpone it, the bigger your fears grow. Often distortions feed the flames, exaggerating the discomfort, and the ways you may feel helpless.

Procrastination Antidote: Ask yourself a practical question:

“What action step can I take and complete in one sitting?”

This deceptively simple question keeps you focused on accomplishing something realistic. A workable action step that you can approach with assurance is a real confidence booster. As you actively engage, the fears melt away.

Perfectionism: “It’s not perfect yet!”

Perhaps you are stuck in “re-review mode”, endlessly reviewing, revising, and polishing. Meanwhile, other key tasks are ignored. Quite often, you are your harshest critic!

Perfectionism Antidote: Call on realism, your strongest and most reliable ally. Give voice to your practicality. Ask yourself:

“What is good enough?”

Notice how answering this demonstrates that you, not your project, hold the real key to your success. Also resolve to befriend any mistakes as the lessons they truly are, then move forward. (This becomes quite easy, with practice, and offers lots and lots of valuable information.)

Urgency: “I gotta do something NOW!”

Do you ever act impulsively, leading to time-consuming oversights? Urgency is fear-induced behavior, too. No matter how fear affects you, your valuable time is always a casualty.

Urgency Antidote: Next time you feel like leaping first and looking later, ask yourself:

“What are 3 alternatives to rushing ahead?”

Notice how this redirects your energy right back to your own resourcefulness and away from your fear.

Fear – YOU Truly Hold the Power

In the act of generating other options, you might weigh factors you pushed past, back when you had first rushed towards a decision.

You can save a lot of time by slowing down!

Fears capitalize on distortions. For example, when you work from an all-or-nothing, scarcity mentality, you overlook your greatest source of abundance – you!

Don’t sell yourself short; take a few minutes to explore a friendly question. It will help you stand in your power. As you overcome your anxieties, you will flow forward with ease. Not only will you work better, you will feel better too.

For more powerful resources to help you make time choices that serve you, explore our Time School page and our Time Resources page. There’s lots for you there!

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