Understanding The 4 Fears Ruling Your Life – Part 2 Safety & Security

Understanding The 4 Fears Ruling Your Life – Part 2 Safety & Security
You don’t need to be racked by Anxiety to have Fear ruling your life. You may not be aware of it, but there is an underlying fear every time you fail to do something you know would improve your life. Even those little actions count. Fear keeps us stuck. Fear keeps us from living our potential, and Fear limits the love we can receive. In this 4 part series I’ll use the stories of 4 women to illustrate how we can identify and clear those fears. To protect my clients, the women’s names have been changed, and may have elements of another’s journey integrated to give you a richer experience.

Safety & Security.
Jill confessed she hadn’t told her husband that she’d been investing in herself by attending personal development workshops. She said he’d been so scathingly dismissive when she first came home motivated to make changes to improve herself and her life, she felt unable to share with him. In Jill’s eyes their relationship was devoid of connection, passion and love but she couldn’t leave him because she’d made a vow “Until Death Do Us Part”. “Besides”, she said, “I’ve got no where else to live, and I’m worried what other people will say.”

One beautiful day a frog happily hopping along came to the edge of a road where cars had made deep ruts. She spied an old friend from tadpole school sitting glumly in a muddy puddle below. “Hi! I’ve just found some great flies, come on up to share them with me.” “No thanks”, replied the frog below. “There’s a sparkling creek nearby with lots lily pads . I’ll show you”, invited the friendly frog. “I’m OK down here, really,” came the answer. The friendly frog made one last effort, “I’d really enjoy your company, please come up and join me.” But the frog below just repeated that he was fine where he was, and had all he needed to get by. One day the friendly frog was surprised to see her old friend out of the rut. “What changed your mind?” she asked.
“A truck came along.”

Our Values are simply what’s important to us, and that dictates how we spend our time. Values shift over time as we grow older and our interests and priorities change. Shift in Values are the main reasons a couple grow together and apart over time in a relationship, and this was certainly the case for Jill. The more she learnt about herself, the more uncomfortable Jill was in her rut. Jill’s highest value was security and she was willing to sacrifice much. Her initial embarrassment and hurt at her husband’s reaction, then her guilt at hiding her education, played out in frustration, anger and coldness, alienating her husband even more.

Together we clarified Jill’s values, and what her goals were, so we knew where she stood and where she wanted to go. We cleared the build up of negative emotions in her body to give her clarity and calmness. Next was changing a couple of negative self beliefs which were lowering her self-esteem, leaving the way free to examine her relationships with herself and her husband. We discussed boundary setting and developed an action plan. Once Jill understood she could only change herself, and was responsible for her own happiness, she was able to stop trying to push him out of what she saw as his rut, and stop resenting him for resisting.

Within the financial security of her marriage Jill now has wider horizons and the confidence to start exploring ways to gain financial independence. Whether her husband will follow her remains to be seen, but either way Jill can now see exciting options for herself, and has the confidence to take action.
(c) Sue Lester, Growing Content.