Ep #42: Overcoming Fear & Anxiety

About 8 months ago I experienced an intense panic attack, I talked about it in season 1 episode 18. This experience can also be described as the “dark night of the soul”, something I now see as the turning point and most essential part of my growth. My dark night of the soul happened due my deep desire for spiritual growth. I felt stagnant, and was craving more. Although I was taught that my religion was the one and only way to receive the fulness of blessings in this life and for eternity, I couldn’t help but wonder if I was missing something. Why did I feel so unfulfilled. As I began diving deeper into my beliefs and desire for spiritual growth my sturdy foundation began to unravel before my eyes. I suddenly realized my life long religion was not LITERALLY true. It was similar to the day my mom told me that Santa Claus wasn’t real, except 100 times more devastating.  Going through this faith crisis has given me many gifts, but mostly it has given empathy and a deeper understanding of how to cope with fear and anxiety.  It reminds me of the movie Small Foot. There’s a part where the curiosity of a group of Yeti’s could not be contained anymore and they HAD to know if there was anything below the clouds. They were always taught that what lies below their little “perfect” world, was the great nothingness. Most of the Yeti’s just trusted that knowledge to be true even though not a single one of them ACTUALLY knew it.  So one day that little group of curious Yeti’s got up the courage to explore the “nothingness”. They attempted to safely explore with a rope attached to Migo (the main character), while the others slowly lowered him into the clouds. As they were lowering him, he just kept calling out, “I see nothing… still just clouds”. The length of the rope was beginning to run out and coincidentally they lost their grip of the rope and Migo bagan his long decent deep into the clouds.  I can 100% relate to that feeling he must have felt as he was falling, not knowing if there was anything below, probably thought he might just continue falling never reaching anything at all. This is how I would describe my panic attack, or dark night of the soul. Which reminds me of something Brene Brown said, “Only when we are brave enough to explore the darkness, will we discover the infinite power of our light.” Eventually the Migo landed and found himself in a whole new world he never even knew existed.  So my point here is that as much as we FEAR fear, it can actually be an incredible opportunity for growth and self discovery. As we experience it, we begin to learn how to work WITH it rather than against it. Another one of my favorite quotes that I mention often is “Fear is excitement without the breath”. I read that in the book called The Big Leap. It was one of the first books I read once I took that leap into the great nothingness. Or what I thought might be nothingness, but couldn’t contain the desire of my soul to explore. I had a deep yearning for further “light and knowledge” and could not satisfy my hunger for spiritual growth within the religion I was a part of.  “You may lose your sense of false certainty – but you will soon realize that certainty and control are always illusions, and are also the sources of much judgment, arrogance, insensitivity, and even violence.  As your certainty fades, you will find that reality (over false certainty) is a much stronger foundation upon which to build a life.  You will exchange a life based on false certainty for a life based on reality.” ~ John Dehlin