• Define Fearless

    • April 16, 2010 9:32 am

    Dearest Readers,

    You may recall reading in a past blog that one of the visions I have for my life is to become fearless. I have only really ever heard of one person described as having achieved this seemingly ideal state of being, and that was Swami Vishnu-devananda. It is he that has always inspired this vision in me.

    Swami Vishnu, or Swamiji as he is affectionately known to his followers, came to the West from India at the urging of his guru, Swami Sivananda, and started the Sivananda Yoga Vendanta Centres, which now have ashrams and yoga studios all over the world. A robust and smiling man, Swamiji created the Yoga Teachers Training Course, which I took in 2003, with the vision to develop messengers of peace.

    Whenever I think or hear or read about fearlessness, I think of Swamiji. I don’t know if he really was fearless because I never met him. I just remember one of his students describing him as “absolutely fearless” and I have never forgotten it. The concept awes me.

    Yesterday I picked up a book I borrowed from the lending library at Hospice Yukon Society called Facing Fear, Finding Courage — Your Path to Peace of Mind by Sarah Quigley with Marilyn Shroyer, PH.D. I had just signed the book out the day before, when I’d stopped in to return another book that had been passed on to me back in February.

    When I went into Hospice Yukon I had no intention of getting another book but the woman there was so kind and so helpful that when she encouraged me to look in their library I took it as Higher Guidance. When I saw the Quigley/Shroyer book I thought it would be a good reference for the upcoming Cultivate Your Courage workshops I’ll be leading on May 29 in Whitehorse and in June at the Sivananda Yoga Retreat in Paradise Island, Bahamas.

    When I got home and began to flip through the book these were the very first words I read: “Stop striving to become fearless.”

    Stop? Striving to be fearless? Really?

    Here’s why they think so: “No book, workshop, or pep talk will make all our fears vanish. Sometimes we have to go on living with fear because it’s based on realistic concerns.”

    The authors then go on to describe things that would naturally make a person afraid like your daughter going missing or being alone for the first time. Makes sense, right? These are realistic concerns.

    “Keep reminding yourself how courageous you are to keep facing your fears” is the sentence that ends the paragraph. I like that. Courage isn’t the absence of fear it’s the willingness to go through it.

    Okay, so I get that fear is a natural part of being human and that if I run into a rattlesnake I’m going to be afraid, but what about striving to be fearless around unrealistic concerns? The fear of failure/fear of success concerns or the fear of being disliked concern?

    Those kinds of fears are the ones that I’m seeking to be free of on this life’s journey. Those fears are not based on realistic concerns at all. They’re based on Old Belief Systems (Old BS) that are no longer working. Can’t I still strive to become fearless in that way?

    As a coach I’d say, “Of course you can. You can do whatever you want.” But what this book is talking about is accepting fear as a natural part of being human. Accepting fear and learning to live with it is the real freedom we’re seeking because that acceptance is what will finally free us from being controlled by our fear.

    Perhaps Swamiji would agree. Perhaps he still had fears that his disciples didn’t see. Perhaps he wasn’t as fearless as people thought. He was still human, after all.

    Maybe being rid of fear is not the goal. What if we were to define fearlessness as “facing your fears head on”? If that were the case then the vision of fearlessness does not seem so far off. In fact, it feels downright happening now.

    Inspiring Message of the Day: I am willing to accept that I will never be rid of certain fears. However, I will continue to strive for freedom from the fears that bind me to suffering and keep me from experiencing the fullest life possible.

    You Just Might Get It

    • January 25, 2010 7:17 am

    Dearest Readers,

    “Be careful what you pray for.”

    Surely you’ve heard this expression. It means you might just get what you ask for and, in some cases, that can mean you will be challenged.

    A few years ago, I read a great article about Jim Carrey in the New Yorker. He is a pretty spiritual guy, which some people may find surprising, and he was talking about prayer and meditation. He said, “When you pray for wisdom you get your butt kicked.”

    Why is that? Because the only way we become wise is by learning from our mistakes. Experience is the greatest teacher of all.

    As many of you know, I pray for courage. A lot. And do you know what I get? Opportunities to practice walking through my fear. AKA some pretty serious butt-kicking.

    How else can I become fearless? I always say the healing path does not work by magic. It works by work.

    We have to do the work if we desire the reward. I have to walk through my fear if I desire courage. It’s that simple.

    One of my fears is the fear of disappointing people. Believe me, the last thing I want to do is create a situation whereby I have to conquer this fear. But guess what, folks? I am currently living out the aforementioned situation. Did I create it? Certainly not on purpose.

    Be careful what you pray for.

    The good news is that I am riding it out. This is where the tool of spiritual perception comes in. If I see it from a spiritual angle, namely that because I am committed to fearlessness my fears will manifest in order to be conquered, then I can handle anything that comes down the pipe. It’s all for a Higher Purpose.

    Not easy. Scary. Uncomfortable. But worth it. So worth it!

    Inspiring Message of the Day: I am willing to see the challenges in my life from a spiritual angle. Challenges arise to teach me exactly what it is I’ve set out to learn. When I recognize this Truth, I can overcome anything.

    Vision: Fearlessness

    • December 31, 2009 10:06 am

    Dearest Readers,

    Today is the very last day of 2009. Hard to believe we’ve just come to the end of the first decade of the 2000s, isn’t it? Ten whole years since the big Y2K scare. Blink and a decade has gone by.

    This is a time to reflect not only on the year gone by but perhaps on the last ten years as well. What are my accomplishments? My wins and victories? What have I changed? What haven’t I changed? Where would I like to change?

    As I look to the New Year, I envision a continuation of my journey on the healing path, cultivating the courage to do the things I think I cannot do, walking through my fear, and inspiring others to do the same.

    My deepest vision is to live entirely without fear. To be completely fearless. Sounds like a plan, no?

    The other day I was in a store that sells outdoor gear and like almost everywhere you go now there was a television on display. The film that was playing showed images of a skier bombing down the steepest mountain side you can possibly imagine, flying off cliffs hundreds of feet high and landing in deep powder, continuing on to the next edge of nothingness, jumping off without hesitation etc.

    Another clip showed a man running up to the edge of a mountain and hurling himself off it, flipping into the air and falling at breakneck speed, parallel to a sheer rock face until, very near to the ground, he pulled a chute and floated the rest of the way down.

    My heart was in my throat.

    Now, who knows what kinds of lives these guys have outside of their extreme sporting habits but to be that fearless in those situations, to see the edge of the cliff with nothing beyond it but certain death and to throw oneself off of it without a second thought, well, I’m impressed by that. Whether it’s stupid or not, I don’t know. I just know I’m in awe of that level of fearlessness. Because I’d be terrified.

    I can’t see myself throwing myself off a cliff anytime soon (though I’ve always dreamt of free-falling from an airplane — I have jumped out of a plane but the chute released automatically upon jumping — that’s another story) but I plan to use those images of cliff-jumpers to inspire fearlessness in everyday situations.

    Can I commit to throwing myself off the cliff of life each day? Am I willing to jump into the unknown with complete abandon? Can I practice letting go absolutely in any given situation?

    Yes, yes, and yes.

    Inspiring Message of the Day: I will look back on the past year and the past decade and look at what I have accomplished and what I would like to accomplish in the days to come. I will create a vision for my life and work toward it to the best of my ability, one day at a time.

    Divine Diving

    • December 1, 2009 8:27 am

    Dearest Readers,

    Someone I know once told me of a dream she’d had of me in which I rolled by her on a skateboard sitting in “boat pose”.

    For those of you not familiar with yoga, the boat posture, Navasana, is where one sits in a V-shape, resting on sitz bones, legs lifted, upper body lifted, arms steady.

    It is an incredibly difficult sitting position that requires deep core strength. In waking life, I and this posture are not really good friends.

    My friend was blown away by the dream and in a light-hearted way saw me as super powerful forever after that. As much as I would like to be the skateboarding yogi in her dream I know the dream was about her power and her strength, not mine.

    Last night I had a similar dream about having that kind of physical power myself. In the dream, I did a free handstand at the edge of a swimming pool, lowered my legs halfway so that my body was in the shape of a ninety degree angle, propelled myself upright into the air about twenty feet above the pool, hovered for a second or two, and then sliced down into the water in a perfect foot-first dive.

    Wow. Totally fearless. Feeling no doubt whatsoever in my ability to do it. Supreme confidence. It was spectacular.

    The funny thing is, when I went to do the dive again moments later I was unable to do so. I couldn’t remember how I’d gotten up into the handstand, my strength failed me and I fell backward into the pool.

    Doubt and fear made it impossible for me to repeat the action.

    Years ago I took a dream workshop and learned the Carl Jung approach to dream interpretation and it’s a fascinating exercise to go through our dreams using this method. I won’t do that here but suffice it to say I believe the dream was about the varying limits of personal power.

    Is our personal power limitless? Am I the only limit to the power I have?

    I like to believe so.

    My doubt is the only thing stopping me from doing a splendid hand-stand, perfect dive. My fear is what stops me from hovering above life’s problems.

    When “I” get out of the way, when I allow the Life Force Energy of the Universe to work through me, there are no limits to what I am able to achieve.

    I awoke this morning with that dream still vivid, that feeling of fearlessness permeating my cells. I’m going to carry it with me all day.

    Inspiring Message of the Day: Let me be fearless today. Let me believe that I am able to anything. Anything! Even hover above Earth’s problems, with strength supreme.

    Walk Through the Fear

    • November 12, 2009 6:44 am

    I have a full day of shooting ahead. No, I’m not going on a duck hunt, I’m creating a video about the Yukon for the 2010 Olympics and we’re filming a segment today.

    I’ve got a small crew assembled and we’re heading out into the urban landscape to talk to Yukoners of all ages and races about why they live in this magnificent place. It’s going to be an adventure.

    Trouble is, I have woken up feeling extremely exhausted. My energy is very low.

    Now, this could be because I am, in fact, tired. Although I have been averaging between 7 and 8 hours of sleep a night, I have been waking up at five and putting in long, full days. I’ve been resting during the day, taking cat naps if and when necessary but it’s been a marathon week.

    My low energy could also be due to fear. Fear baffles me. How is it possible that I can have a crackerjack team that is well prepared for the day, a track record of successful shoots behind me, and a deep, abiding faith in the loving and supportive energy of the Universe and still feel fear?

    It makes absolutely no sense.

    So I have stopped trying to figure it out. I simply say a little prayer and walk through it. I do not let it stop me. I say, “Yes, open the door.” (See the blog post entitled Into the Mystic, dated 9/29/09)

    I’m feeling better already. Another amazing tool: share your fear. It reduces it, removes its power, returns us to a calm and steady sureness, readies us to move forward.

    There are a few really great acronyms for the word fear:

    False Evidence Appearing Real. I like this one because it addresses the baffling nature of fear, as I just described it. It makes no sense that I would be afraid of something known to me but there it is anyway. I’m anxious. Why? This little phrase answers the question. My fear is a false interpretation of the way things are. There is actually nothing to fear. I’m creating it and I can, just as easily, let it go.

    F$%& Everything And Run. This is generally what fear makes us wish we could do. It’s too much! It’s easier to retreat. Let the fear win. Give up. But no…

    Face Everything And Rest. Rest in the truth. The truth is, I am okay. No matter what, no matter where, I am okay. The only thing to fear is fear itself.

    My favourite quote comes from Eleanor Roosevelt and those of you who know me, know it: We must do the thing we think we cannot do.

    So I’m going to do that today, trusting that everything will unfold exactly as it should. I’m feeling the fear and doing it anyway. (Thank you Susan Jeffers for the best title of a book ever.) I’m going forth with strength, continuing to cultivate my courage one day at a time.

    Guess what? My energy is back. Thanks, readers!

    Inspiring Message for the Day: Share your fear. Remove its power. Ask for courage and step into the adventure of your life!