Fear of Abandonment? What kind of courage do you need?
Your fear of abandonment floods your system with stress and anxiety. Stress and anxiety are top of the list for the causes of depression.
Abandonment happens…fear happens... What to do?
Here is how to transform your fear into the special kind of courage you need.
Is there any way to heal your fear of abandonment? Perhaps…but it is more helpful to see it as a matter of "dealing with it".
Why? Because "healing" in THIS context only means using a "technique" to remove unpleasant feelings. It is dealing with symptoms rather than root causes.
Ok..so what's wrong with that?
It becomes a catch 22. If your intention is to make the fear feeling go away, you become afraid of the fear feeling coming back. All you've done is switch -- instead of a fear of abandonment you now fear that you will feel fear…
Either way, you've made an "enemy" of a feeling... and with an enemy all you can do is fight or run (which makes it stronger). You just get MORE of what you are trying to "heal"!
Fear is "one of those things" -- we are "hard wired" for it. Do SOME overcome it? Yes…and I doubt they read this web site! The attitude of "dealing with it" starts with acceptance (and acceptance is what fearless people teach us to do).
Resisting feelings of fear only makes things worse. Accepting or "dealing with it" is not resignation, it is maturity.
Accepting your fear of abandonment is the place to start because it is... "better to light a candle than to curse the darkness." One small light illuminates a room full of darkness... and
Courage is the light for the "darkness" of fear of abandonment (and …it makes perfect sense!)
Fear of abandonment takes over and I notice! My heart pounds. My eyes and mind glaze into blankness. I feel frozen and/or shaky. If I don't break free of it, I become obsessive and negative, I do mental inventories of past hurts, I find evidence of times when I have felt unloved, rejected, hurt, threatened.
Fear activates an adrenaline stress response that relates to something I have "learned" in the past.
When something threatening happened in the past that was not resolved, it became programmed into my nervous system, on "stand-by", ready for the next trigger. A lot of these "triggers" are from infancy and childhood and I have no memory of them.
When something in the present reminds me of the past fear, it triggers a cascade of adrenaline responses that take over. I've been "hijacked".
Ok…enough ABOUT it…What to DO with it?
Courage.
In order to transcend fears, first learn more about them.
1. Is your fear triggered by new beginnings? A new job, date, relationship? Meeting new people, being in new situations? Are you afraid to be self-assertive?
2. Is your fear triggered by intimacy? Sexuality? Feeling unsafe and unprotected? Being controlled? Losing control? Do you fear social situations? Do you fear communication?
3. Do you have fears about your survival? Food, water, clothing, housing? Do you fear being unsupported?
4. Are you afraid of failure, humiliation, embarrassment? Being "wrong"? Is it difficult for you to be authentic? Are you afraid that you will do the wrong actions? Are you confused about what is true and right?
5. And finally, are you afraid of fear? Does fear steal your calm or make you unable to face your life? Do you lose clarity? Do you have a "fear program" that runs (ruins) your life and disables your ability to move forward with power?
Transform your fear into courage...
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