I’m pissed off with fear today. I’m pissed off because today, fear made me cry and I really hate it when that happens. It doesn’t happen often and actually I can’t remember the last time it did but I’ve been feeling a bit singled out by fear lately and as a person who prides myself on facing fear, getting slapped in the face by it, can leave me feeling pretty sore.
I’m currently staying on an island called Koh Lanta in the South of Thailand. I’ve been here for two weeks and I’m volunteering at an animal welfare centre. This type of volunteering is not for the faint-hearted, we do six, 6-hour shifts a week and between us we look after 28 dogs and over twenty cats. Most of the animals are stray and at some point in their lives have been injured or abused.
I chose to volunteer at an animal welfare centre because I love animals and grew up in a house full of them. We always had a clutter of cats and over the years we also had pet guinea pigs, rabbits, birds and a dog. My favourite animals have always been cats and dogs and until recently I could never decide which of the two I preferred.
Today I decided that I’m a cat person. This morning, as I was putting a harness and leash on a dog and taking it out of the kennel for someone to walk, another dog escaped and started attacking the dog I had hold of. There was no one else around and I was really struggling to keep the two apart.
Dogs are pretty scary when you are stood in-between two that are growling, snarling and biting. Eventually I got them apart and there was no need for tears but the incident shook me up. Minutes after I took the original dog outside to hand over to a dog walker, I came back into the centre and burst into tears. I hate being scared and I think I was more upset with myself for panicking than I was about the actual incident.
I had already been feeling a bit nervous around the dogs, they are all adorable in their own way but they have, as dogs do, a tendency to bark and growl and fight each other. The other volunteers don’t seem to have the fear I do around the dogs and after months of being told by people how courageous I am for quitting my job to travel around the world solo, I felt pretty stupid for getting so stressed out about a couple of gnarly dogs.
As I calmed down and got some perspective I realised that fear is relative and fear is subjective. I know that there are lots of fears that I 
have faced that other people wouldn’t even attempt to and vice versa. I also realised that if I’m to have any chance of overcoming my fears, I have to, at the very least, be on my own side. Beating myself up about why I’m more scared of some things than other people is not only futile but it’s also destructive.
Today, fear taught me yet another valuable lesson. It doesn’t matter what frightens you, it’s how you deal with fear that’s important. Respect it, face it but never deny it or feel ashamed of it because believe me, it will kick your butt.
What fears have surprised you or caught you off guard? Are there fears that you feel embarrassed about? Please let me know in the comments below and if you liked this post, please help me out by sharing it using one of the buttons below.
Hi there, I'm Caroline. Welcome to Life is Limitless, my blog about personal development with a focus on facing fears and living a life without limits. Check out my about page to find out more and pop your email in the box below to subscribe for regular updates.
Fantastic post. It’s so true. It’s like when you wake up from a horrible nightmare and feel terrified – yeah ok nothing actually happened, but the feeling is exactly the same as if it had actually happened. Everyone has different fears, and limits – and it’s so easy to be hard on yourself. A slightly different example – but when one of our pipes burst and water was gushing out everywhere and flooding our kitchen I completely panicked. I managed to get it all sorted in the end but I felt like I handled the situation badly and like you burst into tears. Yet when I spoke to other people about the incident, they all thought I handled it amazingly and said in that situation they wouldn’t have known what to have done!
I guess my point is, it’s all about perspective – when something happens and you have to act “in the moment” all you can do is trust your gut!
Well done on being so insightful – i think that’s the best lesson anyone can get from a situation like that!
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Hey Fran! You are spot on there, it is about perspective. I think when I start to beat myself up that is me losing perspective and actually one of the most powerful tools I’ve learnt is to accept and acknowledge whatever is going on for me, be it fear or anger or whatever. Only when I acknowledge it without judging myself can I move past whatever it is that I am feeling. Thanks so much for sharing your personal story!
Hi Caroline!
What a great post!! I’ve been writing about comfortzone, in kinda the same context. it was because of a fear that surprised me.
I was bouldering indoors and there was a little competition going on; nothing big. Just two dosen of climbers and everyone was totally free to join. There were strong climbers and “weak” climbers, as I would call myself.
I tried the first and easiest climbing problem. 1 was easy, 12 was hard. Everyone around said and yelled “oh one is too easy, as two and even three is not too hard”. I would have been very happy with ascending just number 1. I tried, some folks watched and yelled “come on Irene”. And I failed.
I could cry!
I walked away and thought of this situation over and over again feeling the same about fear as you do, describing in this post. Damn you, fear!!
I decided the only way to get over this, which was obviously my own insecurity taking over, is to look it in the eye.
To be continued
The next competition is in 5 weeks. …
Take care over there in Thailand and most of all: Enjoy!!
Embrace your fear, so embrace those dogs with alllllll the love you have!! Try, you will see!
Hi Irene, thanks so much for your comment! I can totally relate to your example as I’ve done a fair bit of climbing myself and also found myself in a similar position. I think what I take from your story and mine is how dangerous comparison can be, when we compare ourselves to others and feel we don’t measure up it stings. What I learnt the other day with the dogs is that I need to embrace my fears like you said and I think when we can do that we can work with that fear to achieve great things. Good luck in your competition and let me know how it goes!
Having been in that situation where you have two dogs going at each other and you’re the only thing keeping them from tearing into each other… I can relate. It’s a very scary experience made all the more difficult when you just want the two dogs to get along.
I can remember several times when I felt apprehension at a looming task. Quite often, the task is not as bad as the fear itself is.
Last week, I finished reading a biography on Ulysses S. Grant. Shortly after getting his first command at the start of the Civil War, he was sent to attack Colonel Tom Harris. When he arrived, Harris and his troops had fled. He realized that Harris had most likely been as afraid of Grant as Grant had been of him. This was not a lack of courage, as Grant had displayed that during the Mexican war a few years earlier, but was more likely similar to stage fright. In his memoirs, Grant said he never forgot that lesson.
Thanks for sharing!
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“I can remember several times when I felt apprehension at a looming task. Quite often, the task is not as bad as the fear itself is.” Grady I couldn’t agree more with this. Fear is a funny thing and it’s thoughts like this that make me more convinced of the importance of facing our fears and stepping forward into the unknown! Thanks so much for sharing.
How truly amazing. You might think it is not that big a deal for some people, but for me, that would be terrifying. I don’t have a big fear of dogs, am not phobic, have never been bitten, but I actually would be in bits. Dogs can bite and be really quite ferocious, and I am sure that you are working with dogs that are more sensitive to attack – and so probably more likely to try to defend themselves more strongly if needed…..so even though you might feel annoyed that you felt afraid, I think I would have messed my pants.
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Thanks so much Dee, I am pleased that I finally realised that my fear was valid as I think all fears are. But you’ve just made the point perfectly. There are so many inspirational things that you do on a regular basis that would cause me to freak out but you do them with such ease, check you out too
xx