Twenty years ago I felt a lump in my breast. It felt just like what my sister described years earlier when she experienced breast cancer. Imagine my fear.
With the radiologist’s assurance that I didn’t have cancer my fear took a quick exit and was replaced with relief.
Have you ever had an experience where fear, dread or other nasty feelings suddenly vanished? That happens because something changed. New awareness caused by new information, or reframing of old information, can be the catalyst. A paradigm shift can happen in the blink of an eye.
Unless there are real flames licking at your heels in this very moment, that fear is in your mind. If life or death is not imminent in this very moment, you’re projecting fear in your mind. It’s your brain’s ancient way of protecting you, putting you on alert. Unfortunately, your brain doesn’t know the difference between thoughts and reality. Always check for real flames.
That’s not to say that our fears aren’t based on evidence of what could happen, or did happen, but that too is in our mind – in the form of memory. It’s held in our body too, sometimes in the form of stuck energy.
Our greatest fear is uncertainty. It’s about the future. Yet the future never comes. All we have is the present moment. If you can just witness your thoughts as they occur from an outside perspective you are already doing something to disarm the thought. It might sound like this, “Oh gosh, look at what I’m thinking. This can’t be helpful. I don’t know this for sure.”
Remember that whatever it is you’re worried about, or afraid of, it’s in your mind. It’s probably based on an out-of-date experience. And that’s valid. Just don’t lock onto the thoughts. They’re not permanent. Nothing is permanent. Things can change in the blink of an eye.