This Is Your Brain. This Is Your Brain on Fear.

Remember all those commercials back in the 80’s where they showed us an egg frying in a pan as a way to represent what drugs did to our brains? All of a sudden this commercial popped into my head, and it got me to thinking about what fear does to our brains…

Did you know when you’re afraid, your amygdala hijcaks your brain preparing you for fight or flight, which triggers stress hormones and the sympathetic nervous system? Translation: You are no longer driving your car of life; your fear is. 

Imagine the impact this has on your business (and life) if you’ve never learned how to recover from fear.

What opportunities may you be missing or killing if you happen to be someone who is more easily triggered and is in that state more often than not? 

Your automatic ways of being became engrained in you, most likely, when you were between the ages of 0 and 7 because that’s when your brain has the most neuroplasticity. Because you were so young, these default ways of relating to the the world are in your blindspot for the most part.

From your autopilot, you are programmed to take the low road because it’s “safer”. Through coaching and other transformational work, you can take what’s in your unconscious and bring it to consciousness allowing you to shift the pattern that is slowing you down or keeping you stuck. 

The more adept you become at noticing every little nuance of your patterns, the more quickly you can recover from feeling afraid, and the less often you’ll get pulled into that place. Translation: You’ll be running the show, not your fear.

To make this more meaningful, I’d like to look at this through the lens of sales. 

Imagine someone is interested in doing business with you, and it’s time to talk about your rates. You haven’t fully owned your value. You’re afraid they’ll say no because “it’s too much money” or “they don’t have the time”.

Whether you know it or not, the other person will pick up on your fear on an unconscious level — possibly even conscious if it’s that obvious. 

The next thing you know your prospect is telling you how great it was to chat with you, but they are going to hold off, talk to a couple more people, etc.

You think to yourself, “Why did this happen again?!?”

While it’s not always about us, if you asked for the sale from a place of fear, the chances that the client also became afraid are pretty high, and remember what fear does the brain when we’re scared? Yep, that’s right. We take the “safer” route.

What would be possible if you could be with your prospects from a place of love, trust, abundance, and power? 

If you’re ready to find out, we’ll be touching the tip of this iceberg on August 15th from 7 pm – 9 pm at Petra’s in Plaza Midwood where I have the privilege of speaking to the WINGS (Women Igniting New Growth & Synchronicity) group! If you’re in the Charlotte metro area and you’re a badass fempreneur, be sure to block every 3rd Wednesday of the month for this and more.

If you’re a neuroscience nerd like me, be sure to check out this 3 min video about how fear works. Knowledge is power!