The Cloaked Tatters

S1E11 Fear's Follies

• Sandra Labo and Candy Fantastic • Season 1 • Episode 11

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Listen in while we chat about what causes our fears, how we respond to them, and how we can help mitigate the effect that fear can have on us.

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Candy:

Hello, everybody. This is Candy

Sandi:

And I'm Sandi.

Candy:

We're back with some better equipment and have hopefully gotten rid of the gremlins.

Sandi:

We hope so. Today on episode 11 of the Cloaked Hatters, we thought we would talk about fear. Uh, last week, we talked about PTSD in a little bit more detail. And one of the things that I see a lot in my practice and with people in general, oftentimes. is fear being a product of trauma?

Candy:

Big by product of trauma.

Sandi:

Yes.

Candy:

So in regards to talking about fear, What we're going to talk about are what are some of the things we're afraid of? What are the causes of some of those fears? And how do we learn to face our fears or help us manage them and work through them?

Sandi:

Exactly. So I'm curious for you, Candy, when you think of things that you're afraid of as a person in the world with trauma, what does that look like for you?

Candy:

Okay, that's a really good question. And as we were talking about it before recording, I mentioned fear of the dark and that is a direct result of of trauma that, that I've gone through. you know, nighttime, not being safe. I got jumped in a park when I was a teenager with a group of friends. So I, I associated dark with not being safe and that created a fear in me. And thinking about it further, you know, when I did my step work, you know, I, I have a fear of abandonment. have a fear of fucking up my relationships, you know, whether they're romantic or not. And. Thinking about it right now. I also have a fear of not being liked that's been a big one. And that would also stem from some traumatic, mildly traumatic incidents. As a kid, know, of getting made fun of I had buck teeth and then I had braces so that, of course, they had to make fun of the braces then and then being chubby and just fucking weird and awkward, you know, so there was always that fear of not fitting in kind of thing. you know, there's the fear of heights. the fears and they're. Such a broad range of types of fears and where they stem from. And we touched on this a little bit before we started recording and you asked me a question asking about where they stem from. And I would love for you to repeat that question for theudience to hear. And I want to talk about that.

Sandi:

So one of the things we were discussing before we got on today was is fear a product of experience Or is fear sometimes this sort of a rational enigma of being afraid of like the unknown

Candy:

Right. And I think when we were talking about that, after thinking about it, I'm like, I think that irrational would inevitably stem from something that happened in the past, so they're connected. And I think you were saying the same thing. And what have you come across in your practice that supports that or doesn't support it?

Sandi:

for me, most of the time when I see people very afraid of things, it's almost like we have to work backwards, right? So, if someone shows up and they have a massive anxiety disorder, that makes them fearful of doing things, which is a pretty common complaint for people with anxiety or trauma. or just having some negative experiences like being afraid of these sort of random nebulous things that perhaps they've never even really experienced. And that's because the brain biologically, I think, We'll go back a little bit into like the brain science piece of this just because I think it's important to mention. So back when we were cave people, we had a, we had this sort of alarm system, you know, the fight or flight sort of hanging out in that back limbic system, protecting us from the saber tooth tiger or the big woolly mammoth. It's going to come stab us with a tusk. So we have this idea that fear was useful for us back then. It was this evolutionary thing that we needed in order to stay alive. And as the world has progressed into modernity, there are a lot of things that we don't have to be afraid of on a daily basis that perhaps when we were early humans, we did have to. So, in what we know about research, it says that we automatically sort of look for the negative thing first, we'll notice a negative thing about a situation, about a person, about a story, and we'll try to like focus on that, and that's the evolutionary piece of our brain saying you need to protect yourself.

Candy:

Right. And that makes sense.

Sandi:

I think when it comes to the feeling of like fear of the unknown, We're fearing things that haven't happened yet sometimes that may not ever happen and we're our brain is just sitting back there like stewing like the gremlins and the lizard are just Slurping around on it. Just having a heyday Feasting and then we check in with our rational brain and we go Oh, maybe I'm afraid of these things in an irrational way like you mentioned fear of heights And we were talking a little bit before we got started about sort of your fear bucket and my fear bucket. And I don't have a lot of things that I'm afraid of, but when you said fear of heights, fucking absolutely for me, I cannot stand high things. I have never been to the top of the stratosphere. I won't go. I've been to the top of Sears tower because I used to live around there. And when, as a kid, but my fear of heights includes lots of those kinds of things. But then this is the same gal who will get on a roller coaster and dump herself 300 feet above ground in a car attached to a rail and like, have a great fucking time doing that. So for me, like there's an irrational fear of heights when I'm in a building. And you can like lean out a little bit and look like my brain goes, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. But then you go to a 400 foot roller coaster or 200 roller coaster and you get at the top and you're like, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, what's the damn difference? It's still fucking high. You can still get dislodged from the track, but there's a part of me that's like, I'm safe. I'm strapped in my seat. The seat is strapped to the rails and the rails are strapped to the big steel beams. And that's totally a way to engage in my fear of heights in a fun way that makes me sort of retrain my brain.

Candy:

That's interesting. So as you were talking, I'm wondering if there was a component in there where It has to do with catastrophizing

Sandi:

Yeah

Candy:

Cause, uh, when I'm on top of a bridge, for some people it's under a bridge. When I'm on top of a bridge, my brain will oftentimes go to, Oh my God, like, cause it can feel it bouncing. And I'm like, what if it fucking collapses? And I fucking collapse on somebody and I don't. Actually worry about like what would happen to me, but like crushing the people below me kind of thing. I wonder if it's interesting and this could just talking about the fear of heights could be a whole episode and of itself or this topic around it. Like, what's what is the difference between because I did go to the stratosphere and it was a little difficult, but I made myself do it and look down now. Thinking about that. And, and I didn't, I didn't have a freak out. Was my heart pumping? Yes. Was my, my respiratory rate quickened? Yes. but I think about, um, I think it was like 20 years ago, I was married to hubby number two and we hiked up, I think it was called Royal Arch trail or whatever, up to the Flatirons in Boulder. And we hiked up there and, oh, I was, as we were getting close to the edge and walking around where you could look over like some of Boulder and the highway there, like, I was crying because I was so afraid. So afraid. What's the difference in height there? Like I was probably, I mean, structurally safer on that fucking mountain than I am at the stratosphere where any number of things could happen, you know? So what is the freaking difference? I'm, I'm fascinated by that, but like how our brains will rationalize one incident over another when seemingly they're very similar. Does that make sense?

Sandi:

Yes, for sure well like I'll get on a roller coaster a huge I'll ride any huge roller coaster I don't if it's 500 miles in the air 500 feet in the air. I will absolutely get on that bitch Like yes, sign me up. I'll do it for breakfast

Candy:

Fuck. Yeah.

Sandi:

Fucking amazing, but get me up in like a hot air balloon No fucking way. No, absolutely no. That's just a big bucket, a bucket of literal nope. Um, not doing that. But, I, and I, I lied. I have been to the Stratosphere, but I blocked it out because it was terrifying, and I did not want to be up there, and it was, again 25, 35 years ago. Um, but yeah, being up in, in these places where like, Oh, well, if you're leaning against the window and it's this far up, certainly that glass is going to crack and you're going to go fall through and plummet to your death. Like, no, if I'm inside and I don't have to see it, I can do a better job of like not being paranoid or worried about it. But I too, the heights thing, rational thought, um, lots of irrational fears and thoughts around, Oh my God, what's going to happen. That used to happen to me when I was flying. Oh my God. I was a fucking disaster getting in an airplane. Absolute disaster. And and I would have all these irrational thoughts of like, OK, like once we're once we get off the ground, like it should be OK. But then like but what if the plane and like having all the anti science thoughts, which for me is like. I don't normally engage in that, but like, what if it just falls out of the air? Like what the fuck is keeping this big bird up here? Are the pilots safe? Like what? And like thinking, and maybe I've seen too many like disaster porn movies, like involving airplanes, you know, like that, that episode, like the episode of the twilight zone where John Lithgow's character gets, you know, he's the creature is on the wing of the plane. Have you seen this?

Candy:

That was William Shatner.

Sandi:

Yeah, he did. He did in the intro, but. It was the remake of it for the Twilight Zone. This movie was John Lithgow.

Candy:

oh my God. I haven't seen the movie in forever.

Sandi:

Yeah.

Candy:

I totally forgot about that.

Sandi:

Yeah,

Candy:

my gosh. But yeah, I do remember that.

Sandi:

and he's sitting there in the seat and he's like fucking sweating bullets and he's watching this thing out on the wing and then he sees the thing tear the, you know, electrical thing out and he is banging on it and he sees the shadow of it. And John Lithgow is just like his eyes are wide. He's sweaty. He just, he's perspiring everywhere and he's panicked. And I have had thoughts about that. Like, okay, I don't really want to look out the window at night because I saw this movie where like you can like get, sucked out the fucking window, you know, like, and I know rationally, these things are not likely to happen, but our brains sort of thrive on that shit. We get attached to it and we can't kind of let it go. And so I think sometimes we can have these really irrational based fears that have no basis in fact, reality or probability. And the next thing you know, we're maybe in avoidance mode. We're not going to do that thing. You know,

Candy:

Yes. I, as we're talking about Linking it to like horror movies and disaster movies, you made me think of Final Destination, how many people of our generation refuse to drive behind a fucking truck

Sandi:

yes,

Candy:

a load of logs or pipes or anything similar to it? I can't help but think about that every time.

Sandi:

every time

Candy:

behind when I'm like, this is how the horror starts. I don't, I don't want to live this. so, so it makes me wonder from a psychological standpoint, if our fears aren't as irrational. As they might seem, but because of pop culture and what we have exposed ourselves to, if we know that what we're watching isn't real, it still puts, it's almost like once you give somebody an idea, you can't take an idea away. It's in the brain for good. And so going along that kind of, perspective. It's putting that little tiny seed in the brain that Oh, you know what? this could happen. So we better not do this just in case.

Sandi:

I really latched on to what you said about the pipe, there's been so many times I've been on the highway that I'm like, okay, no, I've seen far too many people impaled by pipes on the highway, or, you know, big rods of something that you're like, it's just better to not stand. I mean, it's better to not be in that lane, but from a rational fact based perspective. It's probably safer just to not be in that lane, even if the likelihood or probability is very small that somebody didn't secure the load, right?

Candy:

right. You know, you see the strap flopping around, and my brain can't help but think, if they didn't tie that down correctly, how do I know that the rest of this is secure?

Sandi:

Yes. Yes. I know. I know. Yeah. Well, and sometimes I just get into my head a little bit on the road anyway, seeing people do really unsafe things. Like, I'm having to travel I 25 now a lot because getting my kid to point A to point B. And holy shit, people just drive like they are absolutely like on their, their Mario Andretti, you know, if you're, I don't know who's

Candy:

Right.

Sandi:

or old to remember that. But, um, there's just no need for it. And so sometimes it just makes me feel like on the road and I tend to be a really, I'm a really confident driver, but things like that will stop me and be like, Oh my God, that person's going to cause an accident, like kind of bracing yourself. Right.

Candy:

Right. It seems so, and it's been so long since I studied psychology in college, it, it is reminding me of when we learned about, so going back to your example of people driving like crazy on the highway. It puts you in a heightened state, and in that heightened state, you're going to remember something else from being in a heightened state that is related to what you're experiencing in the moment. I don't remember what that phenomenon is called, but It makes sense actually with us talking about it with the horror movies, like we may not have experienced it, but the brain does experience those things that happen in movies on a certain level.

Sandi:

Well, it's like it.

Candy:

action movies, you know, I'm an adrenaline junkie, I fucking love me a car chase, you know, I'm not experiencing it, but on a level the brain is experiencing it.

Sandi:

Yeah. Yeah. Well, I think it's the associations that we make

Candy:

Yeah,

Sandi:

because they're, we, we, and those are all like very personal and independent. Like when we do like Rorschach testing, you know, that's really fun because people, you know, 10 people line them up and you show them a same dot, a bleh, uh, you know, on a piece of paper and. Five of those people may have the similar thing, but five of those people could be complete outliers and name that something that they think it looks like because that's been their personal experience. So, you know, like for people who have car accidents, I mean, those, those people who have been in wrecks on the highway, nearly almost killed, um, saw their life flash before them, they often have a really, really difficult time getting back on the road. And then sometimes when we dig into that, like their specified problem is, okay, we've got some phobia around driving now, and when it's driving at night in the snow, Oh my God, that's just pushing them over the edge because that may have been something they experienced. Like my accident happened at night in the middle of a snowstorm, and that may just be an extra like trigger upon the trigger so that for somebody else, though, if I think about me driving in a snowstorm at night, I think peace, tranquility, the air is very soft and quiet and nobody's out and you just have the road to yourself. And so I don't have those associations, but I know I can see from the look on your face and what you're saying, you have something to say about that.

Candy:

I do. And this is so fascinating. I love how differently our brains work and how our different experiences can change our programming in our brain. I was just. Talking to Mike yesterday, we went for a drive cause we put his puppy down and like you, he's like, you want to go for a drive? I'm like, well, do you, all right, let's go for a fucking drive in the mountains. Right. And as we're driving there, going around the turns and the twists, I'm like, it took me years to be comfortable driving in the mountains. after my bus accident, like it was affecting me 20, 30 years later. to that effect, like I can, I can drive in the mountains comfortably now. It's, it's fine. My anxiety doesn't get above like a, a two. You know, however, put me back in the city, okay, and I'm getting on an on ramp or an off ramp. If somebody else is driving and I start to feel the G's on a left hand curve, my stomach clenches, my heart starts to race because that is what my body felt moments before we went over the edge of the cliff in that bus accident.

Sandi:

Oh God.

Candy:

to remind myself and that fear is instant. I'm like, Oh my God, I'm going to die. My, my body is telling me I'm going to die. Right. And I have to calm myself down and talk myself off that fear ledge and be like, yo, I'm safe. The brakes are good.

Sandi:

yeah

Candy:

You know, I know what I'm doing. And sometimes even when I'm driving, I will freak myself out. My body will freak my brain out. Does that make sense?

Sandi:

Yes, yes

Candy:

my, my body reacts before I have a chance to like, calm myself or have know that it reassure myself that I have the confidence in knowing how to drive.

Sandi:

Well, I just want to throw something interesting in and there's a video that I give to lots of clients and it is called the fear of unpleasant there. Oh the wisdom of unpleasant feelings And it's a TED talk. It's about 15 minutes long. It's one of the greatest things on the planet for people who really need help in working through triggering feelings. And what she says in the video and what we know from brain science is that whatever we feel in the brain, whatever we have going on in the brain is felt in the body first. So you're saying it's your body. No, the signal has already triggered in the brain, in the limbic system, in that way back lizard part of the brain and said, Oh, we're going to send some cortisol and some adrenaline and some endorphins to prepare ourselves for the big catastrophe that's coming. And then so it's like, I almost want to akin it like to a, um, a slideshow. Remember back in the day when you have to click a button and it would like flip to the next slide, like when something happens that reminds that brain, that back brain, that unconscious part or subconscious part, both of them can go, Oh, Oh, hard left turn, send all the stuff. And then your body goes, and then you get sort of locked in, you know, warrior position. Like, what do I need? I'm ready for battle. Um, And it's just sort of this thing that if we can get we if we know that that's happening and that's the body's warning system Right, it's sending the signals to the body So our body can do something to react to threat or harm or whatever it is if we start to go consciously Okay I'm going to envision what the next slide is. The next slide is me continuing my drive and me breathing easily and driving through. And it's like, we're driving through Bambi's house now. Like we're driving nice pretty road and everything's cool. And so if we can sort of flip and often I call that like flipping the script, you know, so it's like this cognitive behavioral technique, but it's also a visual, a visualizing technique. Visualize the next thing that is going to happen that is good. Okay. that is actually happening and that will help our bodies kind of calm down. Um, so that signal wears itself out

Candy:

I like that. It's actually like the opposite of catastrophizing. taking it in the opposite direction and into a reassuring future scene. Rather than a disastrous one. I like that.

Sandi:

and it's useful if we say it out loud too. Oh, I can feel what's happening right now. My body is doing this because it reminds me of this. And if you don't have the self awareness piece of that, sometimes it's just good to check in with yourself. If you're having a big reaction to something and you don't know what that's about, start to unpack that with somebody. Counseling is great for that, but. talking about it just in general and articulating to yourself. I am afraid of this thing because then if this thing happens, then it means this next awful thing is going to happen. And so sometimes if we just articulate it out the mouth hole, we can start to tell ourselves a different story because we can start to recognize what I'm saying out loud sounds a little irrational, sounds a little bit catastrophic or the actual trigger that we're experiencing.

Candy:

Right. That, and that makes sense. And I've worked on that too with myself. Like, so this is okay. We're going to be okay, Pookie. LAUGHS

Sandi:

had one that I really had to work myself out of and it was getting texts from bosses and when I got my first job in a group practice, I had to literally sit down with my boss and say, I've had some terrible bosses and most of the time when they text me, it's always something bad. I did something wrong.

Candy:

UGH

Sandi:

I didn't do this right, I didn't get this done, this negative kind of, and, and often it was done through texting because a lot of these people had very poor leadership skills and they just want to do the texting so they don't have to interact with you and actually have a conversation and it, and it would just raise my heart rate and sometimes to the point of tears when I was super, super stressed out in my first agency job and my supervisor was just not a good people person and so I literally was like, I took that with me when I didn't do those jobs anymore. And so anytime anybody would text me in a position of power, perceived power over me, I have this huge response. It's just a text going off on the phone. What the fuck am I actually afraid of? Well, because of multiple negative experiences via text with the person in leadership above me or in a supervisory capacity. break me out and I literally had to tell my boss, please just tell me what you want in the text. Hey, got a quick question for you. Insert task, insert question. Don't leave me hanging so that I'm like worried about it. And now when I get a text, I'm like, yeah, no big deal. I don't even think about it, but it took me like six years to get that. like to not have it bother me anymore. So dumb.

Candy:

right. Oh, it's, it's, again, it's fascinating how our brains work and how they reprogram themselves to be on alert for potentially quote unquote harmful situations. know, whether it's mentally or physically, emotionally, especially,

Sandi:

Yes, for sure. And there are people out there who are like, I don't know why you're afraid of that. Blah, blah, blah. Well, because your experience is different than mine. Right. And that's where I hear a lot of people going like shitting on other people. You shouldn't be afraid of that. You shouldn't be worried about that. That shouldn't be a big deal. Okay. Then let's take your worst fears and put those in your face and see how you feel. It's the same thing.

Candy:

And that, that goes back to us. I think we talked about like compassion. It's a lack of compassion. It's not understanding and empathy. Not understanding somebody else's experience, not being able to put yourself in their shoes. Cause I've had a texting issue myself, you know, where I was harassed constantly by this one woman and she would call me, she would text me hundreds of times a day telling me that I was a horrible mother. I was a horrible parent that I should give up custody of my kid. And I just, And so every time it went off, boom, my body shot full of adrenaline and fear and, and even, and I would see her car driving around town and she would, if she, if she happened to see my car, which was very identifiable as my cars usually are, she would follow me. And so every time I saw her make and model of car for years afterwards, Oh, my stomach would just, it would do the same thing, you know, and I had to teach myself. No, it's okay. Like, you're, you're safe. It's all right. You don't need to be afraid.

Sandi:

Wow,

Candy:

you know, goes into, like, talking about the second part of what we're going to talk about. What are the causes of these fears? There can be so many,

Sandi:

yes,

Candy:

many things, and if your brain is making that association of one thing to another, it has the propensity to cause that fear.

Sandi:

I get that a lot, with clients where they're fearful of doing something and I'll use sort of a blanket generic example of like trying something new. Sometimes when people have had a bad experience trying something new, And it doesn't go well and they fail and they don't handle that well or they're not okay with failing or they receive lots of criticism or negative feedback about such failure. It will sometimes make people, particularly people with anxiety disorders, um, and sometimes childhood trauma where people have been rather negative to them and not lifted them up or built them up rather than push them down and beat them up. Emotionally and psychologically, it's hard for people to try new things in a general way. I see that a lot with anxiety disorders. And so my advice is often, let's try to do some of the things or one of the things. Let's just start with one thing. Let's try to do one of the things that you feel scares you. Why are you scared of it? And they'll tell me, okay, I'm scared of this, blah, blah, blah. And generally it's an outside I want to say more than often, more, more often than not, it's a, it's a fear of somebody is going to see me do something stupid. And I'm like, welcome to being human, you know? And then we walk through, well, what's going to happen? What's the worst case scenario of this? What's going to happen if you fail? What's the long term impact? And I like to give people that timeframe of, is this going to matter in a day? Will it matter in a week? How about in a month? Will you still be thinking about this next year? And then they start to go, Oh yeah, no, I don't want to use my time like that. Yeah, me neither.

Candy:

Exactly. That's a great way to walk people through that. it makes perfect sense. Following it, following the narrative all the way through. If this, then that. Okay, well, if this, if that, then what else?

Sandi:

I think it's easy that to ride that slippery slope of worry to catastrophizing, particularly with people who have anxiety disorders or who have childhood trauma where they were hurt and nothing was safe. They were neglected, they weren't fed, they weren't clothed, they were hurt, they were physically hurt. All of those different things, like it can make people afraid of really trying again because it's so related to that core fear. Like you said, um, I think you said you had a fear of abandonment and a fear of like screwing up healthy relationships. That's simply a mirror, right? to what you've already experienced.

Candy:

Yes. Yes, and personal narrative play into that big time if I continue to going to the Fear of fucking up healthy relationships or any relationship if I have told myself over the years that I always fuck up my Relationships that will also stack on top of the fears and create a larger monster than what it was in the first place. And so having to break that down on top of the original fear can be really difficult because you have to start working on, now is that, is that CBT, how we talk, our discussions with ourselves, or is that DBT therapy? I mix them up sometimes.

Sandi:

I don't think we can put a straight label on it because there's lots of self talk involved in all kinds of different modalities. You know,

Candy:

That's

Sandi:

CBT is a big one because CBT is the one if you can change the way you think you can change the way you feel. Well, I don't love that all the time. I like a lot of the CBT, straight CBT skills, but I am much more of an integrative provider using what is good for and what the individual person with their strengths, needs, abilities, preferences, all the things that they're good at, the things that they love, what is going to best suit this person to work through this.

Candy:

gotcha. Okay. That, and that makes sense. Uh, just going back to how the self talk can compound a fear in the first place is huge

Sandi:

Oh, it truly is because how many days do we wake up and, and I used to like, well, what's going to happen if you give people, I used to give people the example of, well, what would happen if you went to your neighbor's house every day for a month and when you opened the door or they came to your door and when you open the door every day, they punch you in the face. If on the 30th, if on the 30th day they come and they knock on your door and you open it and instead they bring you a cake. Oh, what? What? I don't know what I'm supposed to do with that.

Candy:

right?

Sandi:

Because we've told ourselves every time I open the door to my neighbor, they're going to punch me in the face. And we did never engage, we never engage with the idea that it could be something different. So then when I, when we say to ourselves the first couple of times and get used to saying, I'm going to open my door and my neighbor's not going to punch me in the face, but they're going to bring me a cake instead. That's really hard to believe. Because it's been compounded so many times of getting literally punched in the face. So as we continue just to kind of push through closer to the end of the episode, what are we've talked about? What are we afraid of? And we've said it's person dependent and experience dependent. Not everyone is going to be afraid of the same things. Not everyone is going to have the same reactions to the same stimuli. And that's normal, and if someone's afraid of something, and you happen to not be, let's try not to shame that person for being afraid of the thing that they're afraid of. Let's try to approach with compassion and curiosity rather than condescension and shoulds. Oh, you shouldn't be afraid of that. Well, I am. So maybe worry about yourself.

Candy:

There you go. Exactly.

Sandi:

And talk to someone about those fears, you know, whether it's in counseling or with a trusted person. Sometimes it's just a really good idea to unpack those things and figure out why, why am I afraid of this particular thing? Why does this bother me so much? And that's largely what the work of counseling is in the first place. Yeah. Why is what's happening? Why am I, why is what I'm experienced happening and what can I do to make this not happen and make something alternative be the case?

Candy:

Right. Do some verbal processing.

Sandi:

Right, right. And many people are verbal processors and they don't know it.

Candy:

I didn't know it until I started doing Marco Polo videos

Sandi:

Ah,

Candy:

for some reason I'm able to work through my shit when I'm recording a video. Well, that's cause I'm fucking monologuing about it

Sandi:

right,

Candy:

getting feedback. And yeah,

Sandi:

right. No, for sure. Um, causes of some of those fears, we covered a lot of that, and everyone's gonna have individual things that they're afraid of that made them afraid of this particular thing. So again, I think getting curious and being like curious about why, why am I feeling the way I'm feeling about this? I feel like, or I think rationally, that this shouldn't bother me to the degree that it does. We're shitting on ourselves when we say that, but it is good work to investigate. What are the things they're attached to? What could have caused this?

Candy:

those are good things to think about because they'll come into play on, how we can face those fears.

Sandi:

Yes, correct, correct. So what are your thoughts, Candy, on how we continue to learn about facing our fears?

Candy:

I think that one of the most important things that you just mentioned is talking about it with somebody first and foremost, because that in a way is an exposure therapy. Just talking about it because as we mentioned before, even just viewing something from afar, whether it's in a movie or even reading about it, the body can experience it a little bit. So each time we talk about our fears, they will have less of an impact. on us. And for myself, exposure therapy was a huge help. And we talked about driving in the mountains. I finally decided, fuck it, I'm going to have to go for a drive. I'll go as far as I can. each time I drove, it was less and less impactful as far as the fear component goes. And like I said, it still crops up, but In addition to the exposure therapy, I've learned how to talk myself down from the ledge, you know, uh, picking up skills on reassuring myself that I am in a safe space there are all sorts of different kinds of skills, you know, my anxiety can go through the roof and I have fidget toys for that. So there are a lot of ways that we can help work through and even deflect some of those. feelings that pop up with fear. In any given situation

Sandi:

Yeah, again, not just because I'm a therapist, but because I've always been a big talker. It's the number one thing that used to get me in trouble in school as a grade school kid. Um, you know, she likes to talk to everybody, you know, like, yeah, I may as well have had therapist tattooed on my forehead. Um, but that idea of talking things out with people and that verbal processing because sometimes when we hear ourselves say the really wonky Irrational thing that we think we say it out loud not just to somebody else But saying hearing us say it to ourselves and we go. Oh, well, that's probably not the most helpful thing I can say You You know, like when people, and we've all done it, of course, you know, we've all had that sort of rabid self talk that's really negative and unhelpful. but when, when I have clients who do this and they're having like a panic attack, one of the things that I encourage them to say is, I know this is going to pass. This is temporary. It's not gonna kill me. I may feel like I'm dying, but this has happened before, and I know what to do to calm myself and my body down.

Candy:

one thing you just said that I have actually said to myself for a long time is this is just temporary it would be a mantra sometimes when going through something rough. I have not had to say that to myself for a while, when I was really in the shit, I would have to, I just be like, this is just temporary. This is just temporary. You know, this too shall pass. Whatever, you know, however you wanna say it. Yes. That is so helpful. It has been so helpful for me in the past to get to work through things.

Sandi:

I think the other thing that's helpful for people is reading stories, and I kind of mine social media for this. Reddit is one of those sites that sometimes I'll encourage people to be like, Let's go look and not so much. Clients, but like just in a general way, like if I'm talking to people on the internet and they're curious about, well, is this only me? Well, no, it's probably not only you. Go, go Google Reddit and figure out, you know, anxiety and panic disorder. Like, what is that? What are other people going through? And sometimes just knowing that you're not the only one who has a certain specific phobia or fear of something. A, B, or C, knowing that you're not the only person doing it can be super helpful and makes us feel, you know, a little less nuts about it, like, oh, well, this is normal because of these things that happen, this makes perfect sense why I'm having the reaction that I'm having, normalizing it, first of all, right, and then also normalizing that this, my brain, my limbic system, my lizard brain is not It is the one in charge and the wizard brain is the one that wants to be in charge. So let's take our magic wand and cast a spell on the lizard and say, be gone, irrational thoughts. And when I use that analogy in, in services, people always laugh. They're like, Oh my God, wizard brain, lizard brain. I would totally remember that. And it helps even adults, you know,

Candy:

Yes, it does. It's brilliant. I, I think I've heard you say that before, but just now it, it's, uh, hit me more so because that makes sense. You know, you've got your, your base part of your thinking where it's not even thinking, it's just doing versus the higher self.

Sandi:

for sure. Well, um, I think we'd encourage you to maybe after listening, take a little inventory, figure out what are the things that I'm afraid of. And if it's something that's standing in your way, if it's something that's interfering with your activities of daily living, your daily functioning, your relationships, your job, your level of stress, maybe it's time to check in with yourself about the things that you're afraid of and see if it warrants that much fear. Or as I like to say, Kind of use the term energy. Is the energy you're spending on this worthwhile or would it be better to take that energy and try to consciously push it towards something that's more helpful and perhaps healthy?

Candy:

Absolutely. I love that advice. And I would like to include a link if we can in the notes or write down that video that you mentioned, the wisdom of unpleasant feelings, the TED talk video,

Sandi:

Yeah. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. If you want to Google it before and you don't want to look at the link, it's called the gifted wisdom of unpleasant feelings.

Candy:

love that. I'm going to watch that when we're done recording

Sandi:

It's a lot of good information. and you can use it for, I think she talks about six to eight different like emotions that you can use it for, but you can use it for anything that's getting in your way. Especially if it's more anxiety or mood related where it just kind of springs up and you're like, oh shit you again and

Candy:

Right.

Sandi:

So is that all we have for everyone today candy?

Candy:

I believe that's all we have on this

Sandi:

Yeah,

Candy:

for today.

Sandi:

we'll come back to it because there's some other things as we get maybe closer to Halloween, too That can be a, uh, it's a scary holiday on purpose and fear is related in that. So maybe we can dig deeper and drill down into why is that so? And why is that helpful

Candy:

The sound of that.

Sandi:

to be fun?

Candy:

Well, thank everybody.

Sandi:

Yeah.

Candy:

for joining us.

Sandi:

Yes. Thank you. And this closes out episode 11 and we will see you next week. Peace out.

Candy:

Bye bye.

People on this episode

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Candy Fantastic

Co-host
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Sandi Labo

Co-host