Is fear broadcasting throughout your world these days? Is the news about the Coronavirus shooting shrapnel from your television screen?  Worry thoughts swirling dizzily around in your head? Does panic erupt from the uncertainty? Are your children picking up on underlying fears and anxiety?

I know I’ve certainly felt waves of panic and anxiety flowing through me. I’m grateful to have tools and skills to release fear and embrace more elevated emotions. That’s what I want to share with you here.

The first step is to shift our mindset from panic to possibility.  The two Chinese characters that make up the word “crisis” translate into “dangerous” and “opportunity.” Dangerous because if we get lost in the fear we will stay in the swirling anxiety that is so prevalent right now. 

Despite the prevalence of anxiety in the air, there is an enormous opportunity right now - and that is to rise above the fear that has been dominating much of society. There is also the opportunity to establish an elevated way of living - not just today, but for the rest of our lives!  As more people embrace powerful love-based emotions such as gratitude, joy, peace and harmony, we shift the overall energy of our planet and pave the way for an era of peace on Earth.

I recently learned that one of the most enlightened times recorded in Earth’s history, the Renaissance, was spawned by the Black Plague!  Indeed, crisis creates a dangerous opportunity: Will we let this take us down, or will we rise above it?

The choice is ours.

Tools for Transformation

In order to rise above, we’ll need tools that can transmute the fears and move us from victims to powerful creators. Here’s our toolbox to get there:

1. Turn off all distractions and turn attention within. Feel into your body:

1. Breathe.  Feel the breath moving.  Breathe deeper. (Do this and take a break often to experience it deeper as you readl) Exhale that pent up energy with an audible sigh… and NOTICE how that feels in the body and do it again.  Aaaaaahhhhh!

2. Let uncomfortable energy release into the Earth as you plant both feet on the ground and press your middle finger into your upper lip 1/3 of the way down from your nose (a major grounding point for the body). Inhale deeply, then let your breath out in a sigh again: hhhaaaaaaa! Feel and envision any negative energy leaving your body and draining into the Earth. 

3. Focus in your heart center.  Breathe in calm… breathe into your heart center as if you had your own central sun there. As you release, feel the radiance and warmth of loving, peaceful energy flowing through your chest.

   Keep breathing rhythmically, easily, and gently, balancing the amount of time given to the inhale and exhale. Feel the relaxation. Draw the breath into your heart center. Intend to draw in calm and radiate peace through every cell on the exhale. Love, peace, calm and safety - right here, right now. Notice: at this moment you ARE okay!

4. What you can feel you can heal; what you resist persists. Get curious now and notice again how you feel: is that anxiety, stress, or fear still there? Or has something else come up? Appreciate all improvements and they will continue to grow! When you go into the body to feel what’s happening, the negative feelings will begin dissipating because you are now allowing them to move as you allow yourself to feel them. Resisting the feeling makes muscles contract around the emotions, ultimately holding onto them and trapping them inside your body.

5. Repressing emotions is like holding a beach ball under water and hoping to settle the waters on the surface as we search desperately for something to save us. This keeps us helpless and in victim mode. By moving our attention into these sensations and breathing into them, we can feel them soften and release! As soon as we notice we can affect the sensations, we move into the position of creator. We are now coming from a powerful position, and our fear will subside.

6. Many of us have been taught to look for solutions outside ourselves to quell our fears. Yet, when we search frantically for a solution, all we do is generate more fear, because a fearful state will magnetize fearful ideas.

2. Soothe your emotional, physical and mental body even more as you put one hand over your heart and the other over your belly with your thumb hooked into your belly button.  Stay focused and breathe calmly and rhythmically. Keep shining infinite love from your heart center and feel it soothing your whole body, especially your solar plexus and belly.

Stop resisting and accept what is here and now. This is easier said than done, I know – it takes practice. This puts you in a position of power, and balances your nervous system so that you are ready to take purposeful, positive action at the optimum time. When your body is in fight or flight mode, you are weakening your immune system, and unable to think clearly. Pull up your strength and be here now! Breathe and get centered in your body.

Take a few minutes to breathe in this position and then change your hands around with the opposite hand on the heart and belly. Breathe.

Note: Don’t give up if difficult emotions stubbornly keep creeping in! Some emotions have deep roots that may require extra help to release.*

3. Stop focusing on what is breaking down and focus instead on the love and possibilities that are breaking through. Think about a car crash: if you focus on it, studies show you will drive right into it! Focus instead on where you want to go.

 We have been riding this earth into destruction and the Coronavirus has thrown a giant wrench into those engines. We are all feeling the reverberations of the sudden stop. Do you REALLY want to keep going the way we were going?  Or do you want to create a better future for yourself and generations to come? 

Everything is created in Consciousness.  Everything was an idea before it manifested into physicality. What New Earth do YOU dream of creating? How would you love your family life to be? When you create a powerful vision of what you want your subconscious will move you toward it.  In my book 9 Ways to Bring Out the Best in You and Your Child  you’ll find a template to get the whole family involved in creating a vision you can start living right now.  

If we are to use this turning point as an opportunity to usher in the Golden Age of Peace and Prosperity we must lovingly and powerfully focus on what we want to create and stop reacting through fear.

Every time you catch fear creeping in, STOP and give these tools a try. *If you find emotional patterns persist and you are unable to shift your focus from fear to desired possibilities, contact me for a free Emotional Empowerment Session.

With my mind spinning out of control, feeling stuck in confusion and fearful of making any decision and carrying it out, I open A Course in Miracles and this text this pops right out at me:   

“Fear is a certain indicator that you have put your trust in yourself.”

What? I thought that was where I was supposed to put my trust. I reread, “Fear is a certain indicator that you have put your trust in yourself.” Well who am I supposed to trust? ... Oh! My God I got it! I was working so hard to take control of the situation and to trust the decision that I was trying to make that I got lost inside the tunnels of my own mind.

How can I truly trust myself – or who I think I am - to deal with all future possibilities?  Who I think I am is limited simply by thinking and defining it.  How, then, am I to trust that I can deal with the unlimited possibilities of what may arise?

Only an Unlimited Being can deal with whatever arises.  I have been focusing on connecting with my Eternal Self for a very long time.  We know there is an eternal unlimited force that moves through everything. Einstein articulated it well,

“Energy cannot be created or destroyed, it can only be changed from one form to another.”

Call it God, call it the universe, call it Presence, call it Energy, call it Divine Light… But call It to you, especially when you are fearful and confused. Luckily, I have been practicing this.  I know that it only takes a moment to connect with that unlimited energy within  right now.  Try it for yourself:

1. Turn your attention within. Close your eyes and focus.

2. Breathe deeply…right into your belly. If you want to release emotional build up from anxiety, fear, anger, overwhelm emphasize the outbreath… perhaps even let your breath out with open mouthed sigh. Allow your body to release tension. Imagine it moving like a wave from the top of your head through the tip of your toes.

3. Place three fingers vertically right in the center or your chest at armpit level. Allow them to wiggle into the grooves you find there. This is a powerful acupressure point. Simply hold and breathe, allowing fingers to sink in gently.

4. Now notice the energy running throughout your body. Sense into that eternal stream of energy. Relax into it. Rest in it. Choose to trust It … right here, right now… in this moment.

 As you open your eyes keep some of your attention inside, sensing this eternal energy. Feel and listen within and do what you feel prompted to do.

Have you had enough of not having enough… of not doing enough… of not being enough? Do you ever wonder, “How do I feel that REAL Joy anyway? Not the fake positive stuff… but the authentic joy that bubbles up and radiates warmth throughout life and relationships.

In this article you’ll discover three subconscious beliefs that keep most of us feeling unworthy, anxiety driven, or quietly (or not so quietly!) frustrated and confused. You’ll learn strategies and practice skills to help you break free from limiting beliefs so that you can experience your authentically joyful self.

1, A fundamental belief trapping most of us is that “I cannot be okay until someone/something/everything “out there” changes.” So I either wait for circumstances to change, or I try to force people and circumstances around me to change. Yikes! Now I’m in for a struggle.

STOP waiting for circumstances to change before you can feel better. Feel what you feel right now. Notice if you stay right in this moment you are okay. Practice being okay in this moment and stop trying to change anyone. The relief in that will give you a boost right away. To feel better, get better at feeling.

2, We have been conditioned to stuff our emotions. Emotions are Energy in motion… they are meant to move! When they get stuck they create dis-ease…mentally, emotionally, physically, and even spiritually. But we believe that if we let our true feelings show others will reject us…. we may even be in big trouble! So we stuff our uncomfortable emotions deep inside and try to hide them. With a whole storehouse of them stuck there, we may secretly feel that there is something so deep dark and horrible inside and if others saw it we would be abandoned. Shame keeps us stuck in the lowest vibration possible.

Shaming has been used as a tool to mould and shape children into personalities that will be accepted and approved of in our society. We become crusty and defiant or deny our emotions as we focus on projecting an acceptable image. The key to moving out of shame and to freeing ourselves from dis-ease is to allow ourselves to be vulnerable enough to feel what we truly feel, and to share our honest feelings with someone who loves and accepts us. The more we honestly feel, the more we heal. Vulnerability is strength, not weakness. If I stop identifying with my image and start living from my Eternal self, what need to I have of protection? Matt Kahn tells us, “The most invincible are the most vulnerable.”

Ask yourself, “How willing am I to honestly stop and feel my true emotions?” Know that your emotions are indeed powerful, but not more powerful than you! Strengthen your sense of the “Eternal You” that notices your emotional state and feels the sensations in the body. 

3.“I’ll “figure it out” is the third belief that keeps us stuck. Because we denied our feelings when we were little and because we live in a society that reveres thought intelligence, most people believe that they will figure it out. The trouble is, the mind just keeps spinning stories that justify and twist the uncomfortable emotion, usually reinforcing our righteousness in the situation. The ego does not want to let go of our righteous position and therefore no healing can occur.

We must go beyond the mind to the emotion and to where it is held in the body. The emotion is far more powerful and acts like a magnet, holding the thoughts in circulation. If we want to be free of the uncomfortable emotion we must let it go. We cannot let it go as long as we are caught in justifying how we feel. We must truly decide that we want to be happy and free of this uncomfortable feeling more than we want to be right!

So how do we let the emotion go then? The most powerful way I know of is to feel the physical sensations in the body associated with the emotion. Give that energy permission to release.

Instead of being caught in the pain, in the turmoil, you can learn to identify with the watcher… the part of you that notices what’s happening in the body. You can learn to connect with the all-powerful light that is inside of you…the still point within…that point which is undisturbed, calm, watching from a Soul’s Eye View. You can learn to relax into that space even in the midst of chaos.

Take a moment to connect with that point right now. Go inside and simply notice what you notice. Breathe. See if you can get a sense of who – or what – is noticing. Relax into that space and allow the body to have its sensations. (75% of pain is our resistance to feeling it)The more attention you give to this space the easier it will be to connect with it and relax into it even when emotional turmoil hits.

Another way to connect with this space is to notice the quiet stillness at the top and bottom of the breath. Even though the body continues to breathe, see if you can allow that stillpoint to permeate your consciousness. This is the space of True Power. In this space you are always enough. You are in the moment. The moment is complete… and you fill it with your Presence. You will never be enough in any other moment than this one! 

You can only be Joyfully Fulfilled right here and now. “This moment is complete, and I am complete in it. I am enough!”

Strong and effective communication skills alone won't solve your relationship problems. That's because when you go to put those skills to use you may indeed slide  into old patterns that are run by emotions. The old patterns take over and you may find yourself right back where you started or even worse - feeling more hopeless and frustrated than ever.

Before trying to apply communication skills, ask yourself this question, "is my strongest intention to correct and change their behavior?"

Be honest with yourself because whenever our strongest intention is to change someone else we will meet resistance.I remember working with a group of parents when suddenly one of the parents said, "I just realized why none of those communication skills I was using were working with Jeremy. I thought that correcting this is more important than connecting!" There was a long silence and you could've heard a pin drop on the carpeted floor as those words resonated with every single parent there.Of course  some correction and guidance is in necessary and even helpful when delivered with the intention of helping and guiding people to develop skills and abilities and to resolve problems - especially if you are a parent a boss, a manager, or a teacher. 

You might say it's even your job to correct others. You might also have noticed, however, the desire to correct your spouse or your parents or your friends and colleagues. The desire to correct others often creates the biggest problems we have in relationships. The problems arise when we focus primarily on what's wrong and on fixing someone else and correcting their behavior without connecting with them and trying to find out how they got themselves into that situation in the first place.You will find people much more responsive to your suggestions for correction if you connect with them first and set your intention to guide them to a resolution that works for everyone. Remember, "People don't care how much you know until they know how much you care."

Connect with people when things are going well and you will find them much more open to your suggestions when things are not working. And most of them important of all remember: connecting is more important than correcting. When you start with the intention to connect first the communications skills that you have learned are far more likely to be effective.