April 10, 2025 • 28 mins
Episode 70: Fear is a Mile wide but it's only an Inch Deep (Leila Hormozi)
Facing Fear and Conquering It: Insights and Strategies
In this episode, Kimen delves into the concept of fear, highlighting a powerful quote by Lela Hormo that describes fear as being 'a mile wide but only an inch deep.' He explores various perspectives on fear, including its physiological effects like increased cortisol levels, and discusses the benefits of eustress—a balanced form of stress that can enhance performance. Additionally, Kimen shares personal anecdotes and practical strategies for managing fear, such as re-framing fear as excitement, grounding oneself physically, and modeling confident behaviors. He emphasizes the importance of confronting fear to achieve personal growth and live fully.
00:00 Understanding Fear: A Mile Wide, An Inch Deep
01:34 Physiological Breakdown of Fear
02:23 Managing Stress and Eustress
03:03 Perceived Threats and Sympathetic Nervous System
06:10 Transforming Fear into Excitement
08:58 Grounding Techniques to Combat Fear
10:33 Overcoming Fear of Public Speaking
12:07 Modeling Confidence: A Strategy for Public Speaking
14:06 Personal Journey: Conquering Fear
18:46 Playing All Out: Embracing Fear
21:22 The Fear Exercise: A Powerful Realization
26:33 Final Thoughts: Walking into Your Fear
27:20 Conclusion and Thank You
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:03):
I thought I'd like to talk about fear,
and it's interesting, um, recentlyI heard this amazing quote
that I just cannot get over.
Um, the person credited withthis quote is, is Lela Hormo, I
hope I'm not butchering her name.
(00:25):
And she said that fear is a mile wide.
But it's only an inch deep
fear is a mile wide, butit's only an inch deep.
And as I thought about that, I thoughtlike when you're standing on the edge of
fear, something you're incredibly afraidof, you think of how insurmountable it
(00:50):
feels to walk and to step into that.
But then as soon as you do, youreally see how shallow it is.
There's all kinds ofgreat quotes around fear.
Like the only thing we have tofear actually is fear itself.
Courage is not the absenceof fear, but it's the taking
(01:14):
action in the face of fear.
And another one of my favoritesis like, is like faking bravery
when you are extremely afraid.
And it's actually bravery.
So what is this fear like?
Like let's break it downphysiologically a little bit.
(01:36):
Right?
So if you think about fear, um, ifwe went back far enough, uh, it would
be like there's a line coming ing,cortisol levels increase cortisol levels.
Uh, cortisol is the stress hormone.
And it's interesting like.
Stress itself, high cortisol levelsto a point can be quite effective
(02:00):
in different things, right?
Like I find, I imagine that uh, most ofthe really, really great athletes will
be running at, uh, fairly high cortisollevels, like a little bit higher stress.
So stress in itself is notcompletely terrible or bad.
It's just when it kind ofgets outta control, then it
starts to be an issue, but.
(02:23):
You know, if you can manage your,your stress, um, and effectively use
it to power you in a direction, itprobably can help your performance.
There's this, um, thisthing called eustress.
And eustress is this perfectbalance of stress and activation.
(02:45):
Um, where if you can get these completelybalanced, there will be a level of
performance, which is enhancing.
And then if, if like you're notas activated or if you're not
as, or if you're too stressed,then it goes the other way.
So what, what is this?
Okay, so cortisol levels,there's a threat, right?
(03:06):
Some kind of a threat.
And a lot of times threats are perceivedlike they're not completely real.
I mean, if there's a person comingat you with a knife, then yeah.
Okay.
Cortisol levels have rise, andthen when cortisol levels get to a
high enough point, it puts you intothe sympathetic nervous system.
(03:32):
So the sympathetic nerve nervoussystem is fight or flight.
It's like, I'm going to haveto like fight right now or I'm
gonna have to run like hell.
But like I said, a lot of, a lotof the threats out there are.
Yeah, they're perceived, right?
(03:52):
Like, oh, my boss is angry at me, or Mycoach is angry at me, or my partner's
angry at me, or like, I don't fit in.
Or, you know, I have that exam onMonday and I haven't been sleeping
this week, or so on and so forth.
So what happens is as the cortisollevels rise, your body switches
(04:12):
into the sympathetic nervous systemand immediately, um, your pulse.
It goes up, your blood pressure goes up.
Now, nervous syndrome systeminnervation is taken away from your
digestive and reproductive organs.
And it's interesting in that way.
People who are in long-term chronicstress, you notice how a lot of people
(04:34):
will have upset, upset stomachs.
They'll have digestive issues ifthey're stressed for a long time.
And like as my wife usedto say in her acupuncture
practice, that sometimes people.
Who really wanted to get pregnant andhave a baby, they're having a lot of
trouble because there's too much stress.
And she would say, why don't youguys just like, forget about worrying
(04:56):
about this and go on a vacation?
And so often they came backand they were pregnant.
So as your, as your blood pressurerises and innervation is taken away from
your reproductive and digestive organs,um, it's rerouted to your muscles.
(05:16):
Basically fight or flight.
And it's interesting with that, allthat extra innervation going to your
muscles, more oxygen probably, Iimagine that glu glucose levels go up
to activate, uh, muscle contraction.
Um, you get warmer.
Uh, a lot of people start sweatsweating, maybe if it's such an intense,
(05:42):
uh, no adrenaline and noradrenalineare dumped from your adrenal glands.
That's kind of like thatagitation you feel and sweat.
So this is, this is physiologicallywhat's happening when you're afraid.
It is interesting.
(06:02):
I was talking to one of myrunners the other day and I was
saying, did you realize that?
And, and do you realize that in thebody, the, the feeling, the overall
feeling of like extreme fear or extremeexcitement, the sensation that's in
(06:22):
your body is pretty much identical.
The only difference is what you'rethinking in your mind, right?
Which makes me stand a reason.
You know, what if?
What if in that moment of fear that youhad the ability, and now this is the other
(06:43):
problem, when you're in the sympatheticnervous system, when you're in that.
Fight or flight response,uh, cognition goes down.
So it's harder to like find a wayto get your feet back on the ground.
But what if, what if you could, one, youcould change your thoughts in that moment.
Uh, this runner was saying, yeah, my coachused to said when you're, I was really
(07:06):
afraid, or somebody was really afraidjust before the race, he, he made us.
Speak out loud that this isnot fear, this is excitement.
And it's, it's funny when you,sometimes when you name something,
(07:27):
just, just the act ofnaming it could change it.
So maybe, maybe that's one strategy,especially if you're, you're coming in
before a game or just before a race.
Is dam it.
This is not fear, this isexcitement because they're exactly
(07:52):
the same state in the body.
But you know how fear can be, um, itcan be paralyzing for some people or it
can, it can take away from the moment.
But the crazy thing is excitementbrings you fully into that moment.
It's like you are a hundred percent there.
This is so amazing.
(08:15):
So maybe that would be one strategyyou could, you could think about.
Like, um, one of the other strategiesthat I love is when we're afraid
or we're anxious or we're worried,you know, fear, anxiety, worry.
These things onlyactually live in the past.
(08:38):
Like something has happened in thepast that you're afraid, uh, catching
up to you or something that'shappened in the past that could happen
again, or they live in the future.
Like in a future that you are, uh,worried about, you're scared of that.
Like you think it's gonnago the negative way.
Right?
(08:58):
And one of the, one of the ways I feel youcould deal with this is a few deep breaths
and press your feet into the ground.
And it's, it's really interesting, like,have you ever noticed that the majority
of your life, you have no clue that youactually have feet unless they, unless
they hurt or you, you stub your toe.
(09:20):
Like we literally were floating.
Like our existence is aboutfloating in space with no
connection the majority of the time.
So as you're listening to this,if you're sitting down right
now, start pressing your feet inthe ground and I'm doing it too.
Keep on pressing your feetin the ground and take note.
(09:40):
Did you know you hadfeet before you started?
Put like, okay, cognitively, we allunderstand we have feet, but were
you aware, were you present to thefact that you had feet before you
started pressing in the ground?
And as I'm pressing into theground, my feet into the ground.
Now I had some kind of thoughts inthe background, but as I'm pressing
my feet in the ground, the thoughts inthe background are dissipating and I'm
(10:03):
spending more of my awareness on my feet.
And now there's, I'm stop stopping.
I'm pressing my feet to theground and now I feel a sensation.
It's kind of like a tingling on thebottom of my foot on the forefoot,
and I'm very present to the forefoot.
And it's interesting.
My mind's quiet now.
(10:24):
So maybe this is a tool youcould use if you're feeling fear
now, if you're feeling fear.
Say you are called to standin front of a group and speak.
I remember I, I did all a bunch ofinspire, really inspirational courses
(10:47):
and at times, you know, they'd, you,they'd want you to come up front and,
and speak into the microphone andI was like, just terrified of that.
Um.
Because I'd spent a lifetime of trippingover my, wor my own words, and then
just going completely red face and beingcompletely embarrassed about how I was
(11:10):
showing up, like so self-conscious.
And one time they, theytold me this trick.
So if you're feeling fear, say you haveto do a presentation or you have to
talk in front of, uh, the work group,or if you have to do it at school, or
there's some opportunity where you needto get up in front of a crowd of people.
(11:31):
Now, a lot of people have said,if you need to speak in front of
a crowd, just imagine everybodyin their underwear and like, eh,
that never worked for me honestly.
Now I'm just embarrassed foreverybody in their underwear.
But this, um, one of the, one ofthe course leaders said, listen,
there is this way that you canreduce the risk to yourself
(11:55):
and get up there.
And talk in front of agroup very confidently.
And I love this.
I used to talk to this, talk to myclasses about this when I was teaching
in the massage therapy program.
And I would say this is calledmodeling, not like I am a
model and you know what I mean?
No, it's like modeling is find someone inyour life or in your class or something
(12:20):
who's just amazing at presenting orspeaking in front of a group like.
Watch them like really, really focuson how do they stand up and like how
do they, how do they confidently walkup to speak in front of the class?
How do they hold themselves?
What are their mannerisms?
How do they hold their face?
How do they move their hands?
(12:42):
Now when you're called to, todo that, you stand up exactly
like they stand up, you walk up.
Exactly.
Maybe they, they're walking up onthe stage and they kind of do a nice,
nice little hop onto the stage andyou do that and you hold yourself in
front of the mic and you just likemodel their movements, motions and
actions and speak as they speak.
(13:04):
And the crazy thing is like whereasbefore you were afraid because it was
you going up to do this, like thisspeak, this conversation, this talk.
Now it's not you anymore,you're actually them.
So there's very little risk to younow because like if they, if they
(13:25):
screw up on that talk, it was them.
It's not, not you.
'cause you're, you're modeling after them.
So that would be one reallyinteresting way, something to
practice, something to to see,
you know, fears, like I said, fears.
(13:45):
Fear lives in the past or the future.
It doesn't live in the present moment.
And they're usually related tosomething that you've done before.
It's like, I've talked about this before,but this the, the ego, the sense of
identity, that inner dialogue, thatconversation that's going on in your head.
(14:06):
And I do remember when I developedthis intense fear of speaking
in front of people, and it waswhen I was probably in grade.
Probably in grade five we'd moved to,we moved to, uh, a new town and now, um,
it's time to try to fit in somewhere else.
(14:27):
I was already self, self-conscious ofmyself and I remember it was probably
coming into Christmas break and youknow how when you're in school we're
coming into Christmas break and like.
Um, it's gonna be a day of moviesand fun and maybe some, some snacks.
And like we had this one teacher, Ican't remember why our regular teacher
(14:51):
wasn't there, but this, this one extrateacher, and she came up with all these
little things that people could do.
And if they were able to, if theywere willing to or able to do
it, then they would get a prize.
So she played this kind of weird musicand she said, anybody who can dance
to this whole song will get a prize.
(15:14):
And I went for it.
And like just self-expression,having fun and going for it.
And then somewhere as it wasgetting to the end, I heard
somebody say, what a loser.
Oh my God.
So embarrassing.
And I heard all these thoughts in thebackground and I was so deeply embarrassed
(15:39):
because, you know, I, thesense of identity, the ego,
it creates this vision of you.
Like,
and then anytime,
anytime you try to step out of that.
It drowns you with fear, fear,cortisol levels, increased blood
pressure, increased heart rate.
(16:00):
It's like,
and it,
it's not a, like that sense ofidentity, the internal, it's not a
terrible thing, it's just, it's tryingto protect you from getting hurt.
'cause literally my internaldialogue said in that moment,
never gonna let that happen again.
(16:22):
And it took me a lot ofyears to unwind that.
'cause every time I went to try tospeak, answer a question, get in
front of a class, it was just fear.
Fear, fear, fear, heart rate,increased sweating, like panic.
It took me a lot of years torealize that that internal dialogue.
(16:47):
Was trying to protect me, number one.
Well, first off that it wasactually separate from my
cognitive ability to do things.
'cause I thought that was me at one point.
But I also learned that itwas there to protect me.
But the way it goes about protectingus is by keeping us small.
(17:14):
And at one point I realized thatI don't want to be small anymore,
so I would just tell it thank youfor sharing, and I would go and
do what I needed to do anyway.
And like I said, I was so self-conscious,so I started, uh, creating little,
(17:36):
little things in my life like I would.
Talk to people like in, in less riskysituations, I would, um, do things
that would make me stand out a bitand get a little bit embarrassed.
It's like, it's like slowly, slowly,like exposing me, exposing myself to
(17:58):
that kind of fear and stuff like that.
And, and like, and then steppingback, recovering, doing it again.
'cause I feel like ifyou can start like doing.
Like baby steps towards experiencing thefear, the embarrassment and all that, and
recovering and seeing it wasn't terrible.
Eventually you will get to the point
(18:22):
where you can tolerate it more and more,and then maybe when that internal dialogue
says, don't do it, don't do it, you'regonna be embarrassed and you can just say,
thank you for sharing, and do it anyway.
Feel your fear.
(18:42):
And then do it anyway.
Now it's interesting, later in life,that same inspirational course I was
doing, um, I took one of the advancedcourses in, it's this, this thing's incre.
It's incredibly crazy.
You go from early morning to likeone in the, like early, early in
(19:06):
the am till one in the morning.
And then you're back the next day, earlyin the morning and like your go, go, go
through all this incredible information.
It's a group dynamic.
There's about 170 people in the room.
It's super powerful.
And I remember the, the leader on thefirst day he said this and it's like, I
(19:28):
take this onto varying degrees in my life.
I would, I would be in.
Really, really inspired.
If I could get to thatplace, I'm gonna keep 'em.
Like, I'm not saying if I could, whenI get to that place where I am playing
all out in every area of my life, nomatter what all the time, and basically
(19:49):
what he said, so it's like this is,this course is like life, right?
It's just like life.
There's a lot of people and say there'sa game going on and there's a lot
of people standing on the sidelines.
You know, cheering for all the peoplein the game and yeah, that's in times
of my life or in a race, cheering,taking pictures on the sidelines.
(20:15):
And then there's some people who jumpin every once in a while, but you know,
they wanna be subbed out every oncein a while, get back on the sidelines.
Right.
And then he said, there's these people,
they just jump in.
They get right in 100% in thatgame the whole time, and the coach
(20:36):
is going time to be subbed off.
And they're like, no, don't take me out.
Like, no, just leave me on.
And they wanna be there the wholegame and give it their all and
just completely live all out.
And he said, listen, you can dothis course in one of three ways.
You can sit on thesidelines and just observe.
You can jump in and jump out andyou'll get certain amount outta that.
(20:59):
Or you can play.
All out.
And I guarantee you, if you play allout, you are gonna have results like
you have never imagined in your life.
And I was like, I'm playing all out.
Put me in coach.
I'm in, I'm, I'm 100%.
And there was so many crazy thingsthat went on, but there was this
one thing called the fear exercise.
(21:22):
And this fear exercise wasso cool and super emotional.
And they set up us up in this way.
It's just like, so what is asfish to water as birds to air?
What is to humans like us as human beings?
(21:47):
And then they explain like, do youthink a bird really understands
or like knows that they're flyingthrough air or is it just what's soap?
I'm like, Hmm, probablywhat's so and a fish.
Do you think they actuallyknow they're in the water?
Do you know?
Do they or is that just, that'sjust what's so to them, right?
(22:11):
They said the thing that human beingsswim and live in completely, but not
knowing they're always in is fear.
And they said, just think about it.
Right?
All the weird and crazy things people do.
Some people get aggressive when they'relike, they're afraid of you, so they're
(22:33):
aggressive or they cross the street,or, or think about when you walk into
an elevator and somebody's in there andthey suddenly avert their eyes to the
numbers or something and they, they,
they're not looking at youbecause they're afraid of you.
Or and you do the same'cause you're afraid of them.
(22:54):
Think about like if you see somebodyyou really like that you would really
love, wouldn't it be great if wewere just kids again, like adult
kids and they had a massive sandboxin a max play playground and we just
like walked up and we saw somebody welike and we go, hi, my name's Kimon.
Do you wanna play?
And we start playing and like,do you wanna be my best friend?
(23:16):
Like, wouldn't that be so cool?
But of course, we'retoo afraid to do that.
Kids are so amazingly and they'reunencumbered by all the crap that we are.
So anyway, so we're doing thisfear exercise and imagine there's
a, there's 170 people in the room.
We're sitting in chairs and the leadersup at front and he's, he's, he's speaking
(23:40):
and he says, okay, so everybody, I wantyou to bow your head, close your eyes.
And he starts going on and he's talkingabout all the fear you've experienced
in your life and all the things thatstopped you from, and all the people
that you never met, and all thepeople that you wish you could have.
And like how tough it is and likehow this fear is gonna keep you from
(24:03):
every single dream you ever had.
And like, and he just goes on and on andon and like, I just got so emotional.
I'm just crying.
Like you would not believe, like just.
Just like all this fear, all thisholding me back and I'm living it.
I have no escape from this.
And then as he's going furtheron, I don't even know why at,
(24:25):
at the moment I kind of chuckle.
And like I've got all these human beingsaround me crying and I'm kind of breaking
out in laughter and I don't really, onthe surface understand why am I laughing?
Like all these people are cryingand they're gonna, oh, they might,
they might think I'm laughingat them and this is so terrible.
And fear, fear broken there too.
(24:46):
And like they're going, he's going onand suddenly he lets us off the hook.
Thank God.
'cause there was a couple other peoplechuckling and I'm like, I'm trying.
I'm starting to laugh and I'mstarting trying to go back to crying
and I can't get back to crying.
And it was like, ohman, I'm so embarrassed.
And he said, some ofyou are getting it now.
(25:08):
And then I just broke up and justlaughed and just like so loud, laughter.
He said, if you are afraid of every humanbeing on this planet, then every single.
Human being on this planet.
It still cracks me.
(25:29):
He's afraid of you.
I was like, afraid of me.
Are you freaking like, no.
What?
That,
but it's true.
This is like, what the hell?
Yeah.
He said like, if you could really getthat to a point, to the deepest point.
(25:52):
That, yes, you are afraid of everything,every human being on this planet,
but they are incredibly afraid ofyou as well, and that's why they do
all the weird, funny things they do.
He said, if you could really cometo the point where you really got
that, he said, you could be themost powerful person on this earth.
You walk into an elevator,stand up the front.
(26:12):
I'm glad we've all gathered here today.
Let's, let's, let's do a resoundingcourse of whatever song you want.
You could walk in.
And maybe that person that you really,really like, that you haven't been
able to talk to, you would realizethat they're afraid of you too.
And just go up and talk to them.
(26:33):
Maybe all the things you're afraidof, you just walk into them, right?
Think about it.
Fear is a mile wide.
(26:54):
But it's only an inch deep.
Go for it.
Go For every dream you have,
walk straight into your fear
(27:16):
so you can see how shallow it is.
And one thing you know for sureis I am always rooting for you.
Thanks for spending this time with me.
Have a great day.
Thank you for listening to thisepisode of conversation with Kimen.
(27:37):
Please follow me on Instagramat conversations with Kimen
and feel free to direct message me.
Also, please share my podcast withanyone you may feel would benefit
from its content and let them know.
And you can find me atconversations with Kimen on Apple
(28:00):
podcasts, Spotify, and Podbean.
Have an amazing day.
I thought I'd like to talk about fear,
and it's interesting, um, recentlyI heard this amazing quote
that I just cannot get over.
Um, the person credited withthis quote is, is Lela Hormo, I
hope I'm not butchering her name.
(00:25):
And she said that fear is a mile wide.
But it's only an inch deep
fear is a mile wide, butit's only an inch deep.
And as I thought about that, I thoughtlike when you're standing on the edge of
fear, something you're incredibly afraidof, you think of how insurmountable it
(00:50):
feels to walk and to step into that.
But then as soon as you do, youreally see how shallow it is.
There's all kinds ofgreat quotes around fear.
Like the only thing we have tofear actually is fear itself.
Courage is not the absenceof fear, but it's the taking
(01:14):
action in the face of fear.
And another one of my favoritesis like, is like faking bravery
when you are extremely afraid.
And it's actually bravery.
So what is this fear like?
Like let's break it downphysiologically a little bit.
(01:36):
Right?
So if you think about fear, um, ifwe went back far enough, uh, it would
be like there's a line coming ing,cortisol levels increase cortisol levels.
Uh, cortisol is the stress hormone.
And it's interesting like.
Stress itself, high cortisol levelsto a point can be quite effective
(02:00):
in different things, right?
Like I find, I imagine that uh, most ofthe really, really great athletes will
be running at, uh, fairly high cortisollevels, like a little bit higher stress.
So stress in itself is notcompletely terrible or bad.
It's just when it kind ofgets outta control, then it
starts to be an issue, but.
(02:23):
You know, if you can manage your,your stress, um, and effectively use
it to power you in a direction, itprobably can help your performance.
There's this, um, thisthing called eustress.
And eustress is this perfectbalance of stress and activation.
(02:45):
Um, where if you can get these completelybalanced, there will be a level of
performance, which is enhancing.
And then if, if like you're notas activated or if you're not
as, or if you're too stressed,then it goes the other way.
So what, what is this?
Okay, so cortisol levels,there's a threat, right?
(03:06):
Some kind of a threat.
And a lot of times threats are perceivedlike they're not completely real.
I mean, if there's a person comingat you with a knife, then yeah.
Okay.
Cortisol levels have rise, andthen when cortisol levels get to a
high enough point, it puts you intothe sympathetic nervous system.
(03:32):
So the sympathetic nerve nervoussystem is fight or flight.
It's like, I'm going to haveto like fight right now or I'm
gonna have to run like hell.
But like I said, a lot of, a lotof the threats out there are.
Yeah, they're perceived, right?
(03:52):
Like, oh, my boss is angry at me, or Mycoach is angry at me, or my partner's
angry at me, or like, I don't fit in.
Or, you know, I have that exam onMonday and I haven't been sleeping
this week, or so on and so forth.
So what happens is as the cortisollevels rise, your body switches
(04:12):
into the sympathetic nervous systemand immediately, um, your pulse.
It goes up, your blood pressure goes up.
Now, nervous syndrome systeminnervation is taken away from your
digestive and reproductive organs.
And it's interesting in that way.
People who are in long-term chronicstress, you notice how a lot of people
(04:34):
will have upset, upset stomachs.
They'll have digestive issues ifthey're stressed for a long time.
And like as my wife usedto say in her acupuncture
practice, that sometimes people.
Who really wanted to get pregnant andhave a baby, they're having a lot of
trouble because there's too much stress.
And she would say, why don't youguys just like, forget about worrying
(04:56):
about this and go on a vacation?
And so often they came backand they were pregnant.
So as your, as your blood pressurerises and innervation is taken away from
your reproductive and digestive organs,um, it's rerouted to your muscles.
(05:16):
Basically fight or flight.
And it's interesting with that, allthat extra innervation going to your
muscles, more oxygen probably, Iimagine that glu glucose levels go up
to activate, uh, muscle contraction.
Um, you get warmer.
Uh, a lot of people start sweatsweating, maybe if it's such an intense,
(05:42):
uh, no adrenaline and noradrenalineare dumped from your adrenal glands.
That's kind of like thatagitation you feel and sweat.
So this is, this is physiologicallywhat's happening when you're afraid.
It is interesting.
(06:02):
I was talking to one of myrunners the other day and I was
saying, did you realize that?
And, and do you realize that in thebody, the, the feeling, the overall
feeling of like extreme fear or extremeexcitement, the sensation that's in
(06:22):
your body is pretty much identical.
The only difference is what you'rethinking in your mind, right?
Which makes me stand a reason.
You know, what if?
What if in that moment of fear that youhad the ability, and now this is the other
(06:43):
problem, when you're in the sympatheticnervous system, when you're in that.
Fight or flight response,uh, cognition goes down.
So it's harder to like find a wayto get your feet back on the ground.
But what if, what if you could, one, youcould change your thoughts in that moment.
Uh, this runner was saying, yeah, my coachused to said when you're, I was really
(07:06):
afraid, or somebody was really afraidjust before the race, he, he made us.
Speak out loud that this isnot fear, this is excitement.
And it's, it's funny when you,sometimes when you name something,
(07:27):
just, just the act ofnaming it could change it.
So maybe, maybe that's one strategy,especially if you're, you're coming in
before a game or just before a race.
Is dam it.
This is not fear, this isexcitement because they're exactly
(07:52):
the same state in the body.
But you know how fear can be, um, itcan be paralyzing for some people or it
can, it can take away from the moment.
But the crazy thing is excitementbrings you fully into that moment.
It's like you are a hundred percent there.
This is so amazing.
(08:15):
So maybe that would be one strategyyou could, you could think about.
Like, um, one of the other strategiesthat I love is when we're afraid
or we're anxious or we're worried,you know, fear, anxiety, worry.
These things onlyactually live in the past.
(08:38):
Like something has happened in thepast that you're afraid, uh, catching
up to you or something that'shappened in the past that could happen
again, or they live in the future.
Like in a future that you are, uh,worried about, you're scared of that.
Like you think it's gonnago the negative way.
Right?
(08:58):
And one of the, one of the ways I feel youcould deal with this is a few deep breaths
and press your feet into the ground.
And it's, it's really interesting, like,have you ever noticed that the majority
of your life, you have no clue that youactually have feet unless they, unless
they hurt or you, you stub your toe.
(09:20):
Like we literally were floating.
Like our existence is aboutfloating in space with no
connection the majority of the time.
So as you're listening to this,if you're sitting down right
now, start pressing your feet inthe ground and I'm doing it too.
Keep on pressing your feetin the ground and take note.
(09:40):
Did you know you hadfeet before you started?
Put like, okay, cognitively, we allunderstand we have feet, but were
you aware, were you present to thefact that you had feet before you
started pressing in the ground?
And as I'm pressing into theground, my feet into the ground.
Now I had some kind of thoughts inthe background, but as I'm pressing
my feet in the ground, the thoughts inthe background are dissipating and I'm
(10:03):
spending more of my awareness on my feet.
And now there's, I'm stop stopping.
I'm pressing my feet to theground and now I feel a sensation.
It's kind of like a tingling on thebottom of my foot on the forefoot,
and I'm very present to the forefoot.
And it's interesting.
My mind's quiet now.
(10:24):
So maybe this is a tool youcould use if you're feeling fear
now, if you're feeling fear.
Say you are called to standin front of a group and speak.
I remember I, I did all a bunch ofinspire, really inspirational courses
(10:47):
and at times, you know, they'd, you,they'd want you to come up front and,
and speak into the microphone andI was like, just terrified of that.
Um.
Because I'd spent a lifetime of trippingover my, wor my own words, and then
just going completely red face and beingcompletely embarrassed about how I was
(11:10):
showing up, like so self-conscious.
And one time they, theytold me this trick.
So if you're feeling fear, say you haveto do a presentation or you have to
talk in front of, uh, the work group,or if you have to do it at school, or
there's some opportunity where you needto get up in front of a crowd of people.
(11:31):
Now, a lot of people have said,if you need to speak in front of
a crowd, just imagine everybodyin their underwear and like, eh,
that never worked for me honestly.
Now I'm just embarrassed foreverybody in their underwear.
But this, um, one of the, one ofthe course leaders said, listen,
there is this way that you canreduce the risk to yourself
(11:55):
and get up there.
And talk in front of agroup very confidently.
And I love this.
I used to talk to this, talk to myclasses about this when I was teaching
in the massage therapy program.
And I would say this is calledmodeling, not like I am a
model and you know what I mean?
No, it's like modeling is find someone inyour life or in your class or something
(12:20):
who's just amazing at presenting orspeaking in front of a group like.
Watch them like really, really focuson how do they stand up and like how
do they, how do they confidently walkup to speak in front of the class?
How do they hold themselves?
What are their mannerisms?
How do they hold their face?
How do they move their hands?
(12:42):
Now when you're called to, todo that, you stand up exactly
like they stand up, you walk up.
Exactly.
Maybe they, they're walking up onthe stage and they kind of do a nice,
nice little hop onto the stage andyou do that and you hold yourself in
front of the mic and you just likemodel their movements, motions and
actions and speak as they speak.
(13:04):
And the crazy thing is like whereasbefore you were afraid because it was
you going up to do this, like thisspeak, this conversation, this talk.
Now it's not you anymore,you're actually them.
So there's very little risk to younow because like if they, if they
(13:25):
screw up on that talk, it was them.
It's not, not you.
'cause you're, you're modeling after them.
So that would be one reallyinteresting way, something to
practice, something to to see,
you know, fears, like I said, fears.
(13:45):
Fear lives in the past or the future.
It doesn't live in the present moment.
And they're usually related tosomething that you've done before.
It's like, I've talked about this before,but this the, the ego, the sense of
identity, that inner dialogue, thatconversation that's going on in your head.
(14:06):
And I do remember when I developedthis intense fear of speaking
in front of people, and it waswhen I was probably in grade.
Probably in grade five we'd moved to,we moved to, uh, a new town and now, um,
it's time to try to fit in somewhere else.
(14:27):
I was already self, self-conscious ofmyself and I remember it was probably
coming into Christmas break and youknow how when you're in school we're
coming into Christmas break and like.
Um, it's gonna be a day of moviesand fun and maybe some, some snacks.
And like we had this one teacher, Ican't remember why our regular teacher
(14:51):
wasn't there, but this, this one extrateacher, and she came up with all these
little things that people could do.
And if they were able to, if theywere willing to or able to do
it, then they would get a prize.
So she played this kind of weird musicand she said, anybody who can dance
to this whole song will get a prize.
(15:14):
And I went for it.
And like just self-expression,having fun and going for it.
And then somewhere as it wasgetting to the end, I heard
somebody say, what a loser.
Oh my God.
So embarrassing.
And I heard all these thoughts in thebackground and I was so deeply embarrassed
(15:39):
because, you know, I, thesense of identity, the ego,
it creates this vision of you.
Like,
and then anytime,
anytime you try to step out of that.
It drowns you with fear, fear,cortisol levels, increased blood
pressure, increased heart rate.
(16:00):
It's like,
and it,
it's not a, like that sense ofidentity, the internal, it's not a
terrible thing, it's just, it's tryingto protect you from getting hurt.
'cause literally my internaldialogue said in that moment,
never gonna let that happen again.
(16:22):
And it took me a lot ofyears to unwind that.
'cause every time I went to try tospeak, answer a question, get in
front of a class, it was just fear.
Fear, fear, fear, heart rate,increased sweating, like panic.
It took me a lot of years torealize that that internal dialogue.
(16:47):
Was trying to protect me, number one.
Well, first off that it wasactually separate from my
cognitive ability to do things.
'cause I thought that was me at one point.
But I also learned that itwas there to protect me.
But the way it goes about protectingus is by keeping us small.
(17:14):
And at one point I realized thatI don't want to be small anymore,
so I would just tell it thank youfor sharing, and I would go and
do what I needed to do anyway.
And like I said, I was so self-conscious,so I started, uh, creating little,
(17:36):
little things in my life like I would.
Talk to people like in, in less riskysituations, I would, um, do things
that would make me stand out a bitand get a little bit embarrassed.
It's like, it's like slowly, slowly,like exposing me, exposing myself to
(17:58):
that kind of fear and stuff like that.
And, and like, and then steppingback, recovering, doing it again.
'cause I feel like ifyou can start like doing.
Like baby steps towards experiencing thefear, the embarrassment and all that, and
recovering and seeing it wasn't terrible.
Eventually you will get to the point
(18:22):
where you can tolerate it more and more,and then maybe when that internal dialogue
says, don't do it, don't do it, you'regonna be embarrassed and you can just say,
thank you for sharing, and do it anyway.
Feel your fear.
(18:42):
And then do it anyway.
Now it's interesting, later in life,that same inspirational course I was
doing, um, I took one of the advancedcourses in, it's this, this thing's incre.
It's incredibly crazy.
You go from early morning to likeone in the, like early, early in
(19:06):
the am till one in the morning.
And then you're back the next day, earlyin the morning and like your go, go, go
through all this incredible information.
It's a group dynamic.
There's about 170 people in the room.
It's super powerful.
And I remember the, the leader on thefirst day he said this and it's like, I
(19:28):
take this onto varying degrees in my life.
I would, I would be in.
Really, really inspired.
If I could get to thatplace, I'm gonna keep 'em.
Like, I'm not saying if I could, whenI get to that place where I am playing
all out in every area of my life, nomatter what all the time, and basically
(19:49):
what he said, so it's like this is,this course is like life, right?
It's just like life.
There's a lot of people and say there'sa game going on and there's a lot
of people standing on the sidelines.
You know, cheering for all the peoplein the game and yeah, that's in times
of my life or in a race, cheering,taking pictures on the sidelines.
(20:15):
And then there's some people who jumpin every once in a while, but you know,
they wanna be subbed out every oncein a while, get back on the sidelines.
Right.
And then he said, there's these people,
they just jump in.
They get right in 100% in thatgame the whole time, and the coach
(20:36):
is going time to be subbed off.
And they're like, no, don't take me out.
Like, no, just leave me on.
And they wanna be there the wholegame and give it their all and
just completely live all out.
And he said, listen, you can dothis course in one of three ways.
You can sit on thesidelines and just observe.
You can jump in and jump out andyou'll get certain amount outta that.
(20:59):
Or you can play.
All out.
And I guarantee you, if you play allout, you are gonna have results like
you have never imagined in your life.
And I was like, I'm playing all out.
Put me in coach.
I'm in, I'm, I'm 100%.
And there was so many crazy thingsthat went on, but there was this
one thing called the fear exercise.
(21:22):
And this fear exercise wasso cool and super emotional.
And they set up us up in this way.
It's just like, so what is asfish to water as birds to air?
What is to humans like us as human beings?
(21:47):
And then they explain like, do youthink a bird really understands
or like knows that they're flyingthrough air or is it just what's soap?
I'm like, Hmm, probablywhat's so and a fish.
Do you think they actuallyknow they're in the water?
Do you know?
Do they or is that just, that'sjust what's so to them, right?
(22:11):
They said the thing that human beingsswim and live in completely, but not
knowing they're always in is fear.
And they said, just think about it.
Right?
All the weird and crazy things people do.
Some people get aggressive when they'relike, they're afraid of you, so they're
(22:33):
aggressive or they cross the street,or, or think about when you walk into
an elevator and somebody's in there andthey suddenly avert their eyes to the
numbers or something and they, they,
they're not looking at youbecause they're afraid of you.
Or and you do the same'cause you're afraid of them.
(22:54):
Think about like if you see somebodyyou really like that you would really
love, wouldn't it be great if wewere just kids again, like adult
kids and they had a massive sandboxin a max play playground and we just
like walked up and we saw somebody welike and we go, hi, my name's Kimon.
Do you wanna play?
And we start playing and like,do you wanna be my best friend?
(23:16):
Like, wouldn't that be so cool?
But of course, we'retoo afraid to do that.
Kids are so amazingly and they'reunencumbered by all the crap that we are.
So anyway, so we're doing thisfear exercise and imagine there's
a, there's 170 people in the room.
We're sitting in chairs and the leadersup at front and he's, he's, he's speaking
(23:40):
and he says, okay, so everybody, I wantyou to bow your head, close your eyes.
And he starts going on and he's talkingabout all the fear you've experienced
in your life and all the things thatstopped you from, and all the people
that you never met, and all thepeople that you wish you could have.
And like how tough it is and likehow this fear is gonna keep you from
(24:03):
every single dream you ever had.
And like, and he just goes on and on andon and like, I just got so emotional.
I'm just crying.
Like you would not believe, like just.
Just like all this fear, all thisholding me back and I'm living it.
I have no escape from this.
And then as he's going furtheron, I don't even know why at,
(24:25):
at the moment I kind of chuckle.
And like I've got all these human beingsaround me crying and I'm kind of breaking
out in laughter and I don't really, onthe surface understand why am I laughing?
Like all these people are cryingand they're gonna, oh, they might,
they might think I'm laughingat them and this is so terrible.
And fear, fear broken there too.
(24:46):
And like they're going, he's going onand suddenly he lets us off the hook.
Thank God.
'cause there was a couple other peoplechuckling and I'm like, I'm trying.
I'm starting to laugh and I'mstarting trying to go back to crying
and I can't get back to crying.
And it was like, ohman, I'm so embarrassed.
And he said, some ofyou are getting it now.
(25:08):
And then I just broke up and justlaughed and just like so loud, laughter.
He said, if you are afraid of every humanbeing on this planet, then every single.
Human being on this planet.
It still cracks me.
(25:29):
He's afraid of you.
I was like, afraid of me.
Are you freaking like, no.
What?
That,
but it's true.
This is like, what the hell?
Yeah.
He said like, if you could really getthat to a point, to the deepest point.
(25:52):
That, yes, you are afraid of everything,every human being on this planet,
but they are incredibly afraid ofyou as well, and that's why they do
all the weird, funny things they do.
He said, if you could really cometo the point where you really got
that, he said, you could be themost powerful person on this earth.
You walk into an elevator,stand up the front.
(26:12):
I'm glad we've all gathered here today.
Let's, let's, let's do a resoundingcourse of whatever song you want.
You could walk in.
And maybe that person that you really,really like, that you haven't been
able to talk to, you would realizethat they're afraid of you too.
And just go up and talk to them.
(26:33):
Maybe all the things you're afraidof, you just walk into them, right?
Think about it.
Fear is a mile wide.
(26:54):
But it's only an inch deep.
Go for it.
Go For every dream you have,
walk straight into your fear
(27:16):
so you can see how shallow it is.
And one thing you know for sureis I am always rooting for you.
Thanks for spending this time with me.
Have a great day.
Thank you for listening to thisepisode of conversation with Kimen.
(27:37):
Please follow me on Instagramat conversations with Kimen
and feel free to direct message me.
Also, please share my podcast withanyone you may feel would benefit
from its content and let them know.
And you can find me atconversations with Kimen on Apple
(28:00):
podcasts, Spotify, and Podbean.
Have an amazing day.
Popular Podcasts
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Therapy Gecko
An unlicensed lizard psychologist travels the universe talking to strangers about absolutely nothing. TO CALL THE GECKO: follow me on https://www.twitch.tv/lyleforever to get a notification for when I am taking calls. I am usually live Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays but lately a lot of other times too. I am a gecko.
The Joe Rogan Experience
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.