Take Responsible Steps
Our focus this week — Aug 13-19: “Be Not Afraid”
Today’s MotD: Take Responsible Steps. This week it has been all about recognizing, acknowledging, facing, communicating, and listening to our fear(s). Now, the next “step” is to take one responsible step forward through (and along side) our fear(s). By responsible, we mean that we instead of reacting (knee-jerk, auto-pilot, unconscious) from our fears, we’re are responding (conscious, aware, thought-out) with/through our fear(s).
For example, if we have a fear of public speaking or speaking in front of a group (large or small) of people we have some options:
1) we can go into full-blown fear, panic, and anxiety, spiraling deeper into the void and just freeze in front of the microphone (this is reacting),
2) we can acknowledge the fear and opt to do some deep-breathing and calming exercises to ease the symptoms—the fear is still there but at least our physical symptoms have subsided (responding),
3) we can acknowledge the fear and communicate with it by changing the inner dialog to that of a coach telling us to “go win one for the team” or “you’ve got this”—the fear energy is used as motivation (responding), or
4) we can acknowledge the fear and reframe it by changing our mindset to excitement—so instead of saying to ourselves “I’m so nervous about giving this speech” we would say “I’m so excited about giving this speech”—the brain now knows that “oh, this must be safe. she’s excited/happy and wants to do this speech” and releases its “fright or flight” hold.
You can read more about that last option via this article: Are Anxiety and Excitement the Same ? In the article they quote Tim JP Collins, the host of The Anxiety Podcast, who says that
“Physiologically anxiety and excitement are very similar. The difference is in our interpretation. If we were stepping onto a sports field for the game of our lives and the crowd was roaring and music playing, that feeling would be invaluable. Enhanced vision, hearing, extra adrenaline for increased performance. It’s exactly what you need at that moment. Listen to the sports star being interviewed after his debut game: ‘So were you nervous?’ ‘No, I was just super excited, couldn’t wait to get out there and help my team.'”
The key here is that being aware of our fear(s), is more than half the battle. Once we see/feel it, then we can take responsibility for it and opt to relieve it, use it, or reframe it. Instead of reactionary it becomes our conscious response.
How about you ? When fear sets in do you usually react the way you’ve always reacted (knee-jerk, automatic) ? Are you open to coming up with some tactics to ease your fear when it shows up again ? The next time you notice that you’re in fear mode, could you reframe your inner dialog to one of excitement (ie: I’m scared to write this book -> I’m excited to write this book) ?
BTW…Here’s the before…the front and back view of today’s puzzle piece and the pretty ceramic box that holds all my numbers from which I randomly choose each day’s puzzle piece number:
Peace & Blessings,
Maureen
The Mandala Lady
Creating Mandalas 🔆 Awakening Inner Harmony
ABOUT THE 2025 Mandalas of the Day
Throughout the year, I’ll be building one large (48”x48”) Tibetan-styled Mandala one piece at a time…one puzzle piece at a time, that is. The mandala design and the reversed puzzle side were printed on artist-quality watercolor paper. The forward facing puzzle side was printed on a 48”x48” wood panel.
Each day, at random, I’ll be painting in watercolors one of the 365 watercolor puzzle pieces, that by the end of the year will become Archangel Mandala #4. Read more about the Archangel Series. The word/message for each piece will be inspired by Melody Beattie’s book “52 Weeks of Conscious Contact”.
Ultimately, the message of this mandala is about how we are all uniquely part of the one.
Mandala of the Day 