Want the antidote to fear?

A good friend and colleague of mine, Audrey Thomas of Ajile Focus, reminded me last week that the brain cannot process both fear and appreciation simultaneously.  Fear exists to keep us on guard to escape dangerous situations - without it we'd waltz into calamities unwarned.

The idea behind 'gratitude journals' (where you write down five or ten things that you are grateful for each day) is that, if you are firing up the 'appreciation' sector in the brain, the fear sector can't work.  Not only that, but - just as fear breeds more fear - looking for positives breeds more positive thoughts.

I thought I'd try this out on Facebook on Friday night (exciting life that I lead!) by asking the women in my online mums' group to post five things that they're grateful for.  We're so used to posts on lack of sleep and teething troubles that it was a beautiful change to spend some time focusing on the simple things that bring us happiness.

One lady in particular has had a rough time over the last few months, and that day in particular.  Her partner has been in and out of hospital ever since their baby was born, having developed a persistent infection following surgery after a work accident.  She was finding little, other than her baby daughter, to appreciate.

Minutes later, though, her life seemed to change.

While we were all chatting on Facebook, she opened her laptop computer, which she'd taken in to hospital earlier in the day so her partner could use it to pay some bills.  To her surprise, up popped an electronic 'sticky note', containing a beautifully-worded marriage proposal!

It is said that what you focus on, you get.  My friend's life hadn't really changed at all - the proposal, and the future it promised together, had been there all afternoon.  The only change was that she'd switched on the computer and noticed it.

As soon as she started focusing on her happiness, she started finding more and more positive things to be thankful for and was able to post them in her list.

Start today

Often, we let the 'bad stuff' take centre stage.  The good things in our lives are there all along - and they're not always in our line of sight because we're not looking in the right direction.

Make a choice today to focus on the people and things, the experiences, qualities and opportunities that you are grateful for, and write these down.  Watch this list grow, the more you focus on it.

If we can choose which part of the brain we engage - the part that processes fear or the part that processes appreciation, is it really any contest?