Fear of Change: How We Embrace it and Learn to Love it.

Fear of change causes anxiety, depression, self-sabotage, and more actions leading you to a stagnant life. I know, it’s been my life for over a decade. At some point, we need to face our fears and stop being the protagonist in our life’s story.

For those with mental illness, change can be crippling and draining because our brains are wired to take it on as fear and anxiety. Anxiety is fear of the unknown, and it’s usually irrational because it hasn’t happened yet. All it is is a fear of change, and everything is constantly changing, even us. I’m still in the process of my long af journey of accepting and embracing change…maybe also loving on it a little. We can nurture happy growth through a few thought processes and actions.

Change is Inevitable. Fear is Unnecessary. Make it Intriguing and Exciting.

Change is inevitable and happening every second. Our bodies, minds, environment, trends, are changing. If it’s going to happen regardless of you being excited, intrigued, or pissed off about it, wouldn’t it feel better in your body if change excited you, or at least intrigued you? One way to let change intrigue you and excite you is with a list exercise.

Change is Intriguing and Exciting Exercise

Things you’ll need:

• Pen
• Paper
• Or Just your brain if you’re in a hurry

When you think of change, your head might fill with some negative thoughts about what could happen. Try to karate chop those thoughts with a list of questions or exciting statements you have about that “change.”

Example: You are moving to a new apartment in a new neighborhood; this is horrifying to you because it’s a pretty significant change. Instead of letting those negative thoughts take over, you say NOT TODAY and ask “I wonder what window will let in the most sun?” OR “This is a new adventure, and I’m a strong woman who will take this on and conquer the f*** out of it.”

Change is Unpredictable. Fear is Impractical. Unless you can see the future, chill.

Change is like that wild card friend, you never know what they are going to do next, but you accept them. Change is unpredictable! You never know what is going to transpire. You can live your life in fear that it may be bad news bears or you can hope that it’s something DOPE and live in the present.

When we think of change we are stuck in the future. The present moment is happening, life is happening, and we are off in a future that we truly are not even sure of. If you can embrace that wild card friend, then you can defiantly embrace the changes in your life.

Some Change Won’t be Good. But You will be Ready for It.

There will be life occurrences that won’t be good at all. Someone might get sick, you might get sick, the revolution might happen out of nowhere with no prep. Change will be scary at times and painful, but you will be ready for it, because you spent time enjoying the present.

Spending time enjoying the present and less time anxious about the future means when an event happens you will be able to think in a level headed manner about the occurrence at hand, instead of thinking ” I told everyone something bad was going to happen, and look here it is.” That energy won’t help you or anyone else, I know from experience.

Enjoy the present, think and plan for the future, and when an issue arrises react because you deserve to and your feelings are valid but also have a game plan to tackle.

Change is inevitable, change is unpredictable, and sometimes change won’t be good. Fear is unnecessary, fear is impractical, and sometimes it’s also very needed. It’s life, and we can learn to change our perception of change. I’m still working on this, and like I said it’s a life long journey and practice.

Solidarity,