Taming Your Fear During a Recession: Part I

Does listening to the news or reading the newspaper make you feel scared? Does walking to the mailbox invoke feelings of gloom and doom? Do you walk around the majority of the day feeling anxious and afraid as if waiting for the other shoe to drop? The current state of the economy is the topic of discussion today and every day.  It invokes negative feelings in most people.

Taming your feelings of anxiety and fear is mandatory so you can move forward and have a happy and productive life. First, we must define anxiety and fear since most people misuse the words anxiety and fear. ANXIETY is defined as the vague unpleasant emotional feeling that makes us feel apprehensive, dread, distress, and an uneasiness. Anxiety is not focused on a specific object. Anxiety is manifested cognitively, behaviorally, and physiologically. FEAR is similar to anxiety but it is focused on a specific object such as public speaking, cold calling, or failure. People who experience fear can lose the ability to think, act, and perform.

There are three main perspectives associated with anxiety and fear. The Biological Perspective states that the  GABA system is responsible motivating fear and anxiety. People often go to their doctor and ask for medication to control or aid in reducing anxiety. Benzodiapines are anti-anxiety drugs that can be prescribed to regulate the GABA neural transmissions.

The Cognitive Perspective states that there are three motivators for anxiety and fear:  1. Loss of Control  2. Inability to use coping skills  3. State anxiety verses Trait Anxiety.

The Learning Perspective states that anxiety and fear are learned responses to situations. Your body develops its own coping skills to deal with the routine situations. Therefore, when things push us out of our comfort zone we experience anxiety. When you hide from your anxiety and fear your body becomes conditioned to the object that invokes those feelings. When you confront your fear and anxiety, your body learns to not experience fear and anxiety i.e. being afraid of dogs. You can either confront the fear (fight) and be calm when seeing a dog or you can hide from your feelings and always experience the flight tendency. When you feel the flight or fight response, take a minute to acknowledge it for what it is.

You can identify anxiety and fear by identifying the Physiological Symptoms of Anxiety or Fear. These are commonly manifested by someone complaining of having a stomachache, head ache, shortness of breath, butterflies or a pit in your stomach feeling, nausea, diarrhea, sleeplessness, high blood pressure, hunger or no appetite. This is just a short list you can make your own list of physiological symptoms.

Now is the time to change your mindset from negative to positive. Most situations that cause us to experience anxiety are experiences of growth.  Do you notice when you get butterflies in your stomach? Do you run from situations that make you feel the butterflies? When you pinpoint the source of anxiety and fear, you can confront the fear. Then you can design coping skills or a plan of action. Self certain people are aware and acknowledge their strengths and weaknesses. When you do not know or acknowledge your weaknesses, you are ill equipped to develop coping skills to conquer them.

The use of Coping Skills will help you reduce anxiety and fear. The most commonly used coping skills are visualization, positive self-talk, relaxation exercises/meditate/yoga, educate you, exercise, vent and mastermind, journaling and investing in a Coach.

When you are feeling anxiety or fear regarding MONEY or your Business Success employ the 5 Steps below in order to TAME YOUR FEAR:

1. Confront the fear.

2. Reexamine your business systems and strategies

3. Look at your budget and ensure you are financially sound or take action to ensure you get back on track

4. Examine your niche. If your niche can no longer can afford your products or services tailor your product funnel so that there is something they can afford.

5. Call or email your Coach.

You must take the necessary steps to tame your fear so that you can move forward and grow your business, grow personally and professionally, and be a pleasure to be around.

 

This is the first of a three part series on Taming Your Fear. Jaynine Howard, PhD (ABD) has over 25 years of experience. She coaches dynamic business owners on how to increase their visibility and credibility in the community so they are positioned as the EXPERT by employing proven systems and strategies that will increase revenue. Are you ready to turn your dreams into reality? Download your free productivity tracker at www.coachjaynine.com

Don’t forget to join me on Friday, February 27 at 2pm EST for a free teleclass on Taming Your Fear. For more information visit www.coachjaynine.com