For the last month, I’ve had a hot pink post-it next to my to-do list. It says:
“We do not make decisions out of fear.”
I put it there because I needed the reminder. Daily.
Because there is a lot to be scared about right now. If you’re paying attention to what’s happening in our country, your community, and in your own life… you know exactly what I mean. The noise is loud. The uncertainty is REAL real.
And it is very easy, without even realizing it, to slip from clarity into fear and start making your most consequential decisions from that place.
Here’s what I know about fear: it gives terrible advice.
Fear is reactive. It is short-sighted. It narrows your vision to the size of a keyhole. It eliminates options you didn’t even know existed and tells you the safest thing you can do is stop. Physiologically, it activates your amygdala and floods your body with adrenaline and cortisol.
As my teenagers would say, fear makes you crash out.
There’s a phrase I return to in those moments:
Not always. Sometimes the threat is real and fear is exactly the right response. But in leadership, in decision-making, in running your organization and your life? So much of what we call fear is a story our nervous system built around a future that hasn’t happened yet. 🤯
Flip the script: Fear is a feeling, not a fact.
One of the spiritual practices that pulls me out of fear and back into aligned action is this: I return to love.
Why? Because there is no fear in love.
When I can get present to what I love. Who I love. What I’m building and why. Something shifts. The fear doesn’t always disappear. But it stops being the loudest voice in the room.
Love expands. Fear contracts.
You will not make your best decisions from a fear state.
The next time you feel yourself crossing that line, pause and take five deep breaths.
Ask yourself: what do I love here? What do I want to move toward?
Decide from there. You are loved. 🧡
