#987 Fear Alchemized to FEAR

Continuing our exploration of Marie Forleo’s four-letter wisdom, let’s take another moment to mine some gems from her astonishingly good book Everything Is Figureoutable.

In our last +1, we crossed out the “I can’t”s in our lives and replaced them with a more honest “I won’t.”

Today we’re going to upgrade our interpretations of another four-letter word: Fear.

Marie tells us that “Fear is not the enemy. Waiting to stop feeling afraid is.” (← Love that.)

Why?

Well…

As Marie says: “Fear is one of the most misunderstood f-words. Left unexamined, it’s a dream killer. A soul squelcher. The grand master of mediocrity. If this were Family Feud and Steve Harvey asked, ‘What stops us humans from achieving our highest potential?’ survey says fear would take the top spot.

Guess what? Everyone feels afraid. Every top artist, athlete, writer, performer, parent, businessperson, social activist, entrepreneur, scientist, and military leader. Newbies to icons. Every person you know and admire. They all experience fear on a regular basis. You’re not broken or weak if you’re afraid. You’re human.”

Amen.

Of course, we’re constantly talking about ways to alchemize fear and use its latent power constructively.

I think the first and most important thing to really get (and remind ourselves of as often as necessary!) is the fact that we ALL (!) experience fear—especially those of us committed to doing what we’re here to do.

So…

Today’s +1.

Marie’s all about using fear as a catalyst to taking action—reminding us that our feelings often follow our behavior.

As she says: “You might have hard that ‘fear’ is the acronym for False Evidence Appearing Real.’ … I prefer the more actionable version: Face Everything and Rise.”

There we go.

FEAR = Face Everything And Rise.

Let’s upgrade fear to FEAR.

Today.

+1. +1. +1.

P.S. Remember: “Fear is not the enemy. Waiting to stop feeling afraid is.”