USE YOUR CURIOSITY TO OVERCOME FEARS

by Sarah Hiner

“Dear Aunt Sarah and Uncle Ron – Thank you so much for our wonderful week together… Every day was an adventure:  hikes… golf cart driving… a concert with my favorite singer… hot springs [in the rain!]... historic towns… I cherished it all. And, filled our evenings with shared meals and spirited conversations… I truly loved every minute of it.”

Besides having a GREAT time with her, I’m so proud of my niece, “J”.  She was soooooo out of her comfort zone when she came to stay with us in the mountains of Colorado for a week, and yet she pushed past her boundaries, rose to every challenge presented and succeeded with flying colors, learning that she has an inner strength far greater than she might have previously thought.  What was the key to her success? Trusting that she was safe, but also I believe that her natural curiosity and desire to learn allowed her to open her mind and confront fears that might have otherwise held her back.

Several years ago “J” might not have done half of those things – but she’s grown up a lot in the past few years and she’s invested a lot of time and effort in confronting fears and building her strength from the inside out. Through that process she’s seeing the expanse of power that she has and she’s learning to access it, one step at a time and one day at a time.

This is my motto for life:  that people have far more power in their lives than they realize. They just need to understand how to access it. 

There’s always a reason why not to do something. It’s certainly easier to stay on the couch in your comfy clothes, then to put on your “presentable clothes” and head over to that town meeting or book club or some other group get together or event.  But here’s a quote from my husband tonight after going to a meeting he didn’t feel like going to:  “I’m coming home. Well worth it. Thx for encouraging me to go.”  Woohoo! Rather than being the “same old boring meeting” that he was dreading, there was a wonderful guest speaker who expanded his horizon. 

Comfort zones come in all shapes and sizes but common to all is the degree of safety vs. fear. It can be as simple as not buying a new dress because it can be hard to find something that you feel good in. Or as complicated as asking a boss for a raise, moving to a new city, adopting a dog or cat, or deciding you need to end your marriage. Scary is, well… scary.

Sadly, we increasingly live in a fear based society, as people of all ages, but teens and young adults in particular, are diagnosed with assorted versions of anxiety, which by definition is driven by fear. 

It’s safe inside and scary outside. We are inherently more comfortable with what is familiar, even if it’s not ideal, than we are with the unknown. People would rather stay in a bad job or bad marriage than face the discomfort of a job search or the very significant discomfort of dissolving a marriage and starting life anew.  Even at the simplest level – hiking up a mountain or joining a book club for the first time – the process is the same: stay in the comfort zone and don’t try something new, or take a chance on expanding your horizons and experiencing joy, excitement, enthusiasm. People who stay in bad jobs may feel “safe,” but they are not experiencing joy, excitement or enthusiasm. 

My niece has a very busy and curious mind. We had wonderful conversations about both simple topics and more complex ones. She was always interested in exploring all sides of a topic and learning new things.  The same held true for our activities. She wasn’t terribly experienced at altitude or with heights, but she was fascinated by the varied geology of Colorado and the beautiful terrain. It was the drive to understand and experience the new that won out over fears of discomfort.  

Safe may sound good, but it can be a suffocating slow death of self-destruction. Humans need growth. They need variety. They need excitement. They need the release of feel good hormones like dopamine, oxytocin, serotonin and endorphins, all of which get released when you meet new people and try new

Are there things you’ve been holding yourself back from? Can you get curious about it? How would it feel? What really happens there? Why does it work like that? Open your mind and catalyze your desire for the fascinating and when your curiosity finally beats your fears, you can live in the other kind of “why not” as in “why not give it a try?’

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