Episode 126
Feel the fear but don't believe it
At Summercamp 2020, coach David Papa gave a personal, entertaining and vulnerable talk about how to be scared.
He believes that the only thing that can stop you living the life you love is not the fear, it’s believing the fear.
Fear is just a thought and a sensation in the body. But when you add belief to it, then it’s energy that controls your life.
In this week's episode, David shares how this has manifested throughout his own life and how our relationship to fear needs to evolve in order for us to make the impact we crave.
Links
Transcript
the title of today's or the topic, the title of today's Friday fireside, is Feel the Fear, but Don't Believe It.
Carlos:And we're gonna dive into that a bit more.
Carlos:Um, and it's on the back of, uh, Summercamp talk, by David about how to be scared.
Carlos:And he, he gave us a lovely vulnerable, enlightening, and entertaining talk about his own experiences with fear and, and hoping that those experiences would help others listening.
Carlos:And I, I believe they did.
Carlos:And so we wanted to expand on that, give more opportunity to talk about, uh, his relationship and ideas and thoughts around fear.
Carlos:Um, hopefully for those of you who might be blocked from making a change in your life, doing something different, maybe these ideas will help you unblock and find a way forward, um, or at least understand why you're not moving in the direction you want to move.
Carlos:So that's kind of setting up the scene a little bit, but as with all of these Friday fireside, they're emerging conversations.
Carlos:They could go anywhere.
Carlos:And particularly when you have someone like David Papa who loves improv, they will probably go anywhere.
Carlos:So just hold on tight.
Carlos:Enjoy the ride.
Carlos:Before we kick off, uh, for those listening now who have, who are new to you, uh, maybe I've not met you before.
Carlos:Uh, maybe just share a little bit about yourself, the work you do, and any relevant bits of the story that you've, uh, created over the past however many years that might be relevant.
David:Uh, thank you.
David:And I'm finally, uh, happy to introduce myself with a title that I like, which is the founder of Unconditional Coaching, which is what I now call my work.
Laurence:Mm-Hmm.
David:Because our essential state is, uh, unconditional and virtually all our problems are created by the conditions that we have in our mind, that we, that we accept and adhere to and start to live by.
David:These are judgments, expectations, these criticisms we have of ourself, of others of life, it's our resistance to ourselves.
David:And when we lose those conditions and we become unconditional, that's when really magic starts to happen.
David:That's what I've experienced.
David:That's what I love to help people with.
David:So, yeah, my, my path here it's a result of just all the things that have worked for me to shift and transform my life the most.
David:I mean, some, some interesting things have happened to me, especially in the last few years.
David:You know, I ended up going from someone who, you know, never thought they wanted kids to being unbelievably excited about being a father.
David:I went from someone who started out working for themselves, was making, uh, you know, around 50,000 a year, and then o uh, I managed, uh, over time to hit six figures.
David:You know, I went from someone who, um, never let themselves fully express who they, who they really are in terms of their performance to performing improv on stage, you know, uh, twice a month for five years.
David:Then doing standup, and then getting my first acting role, professional acting role.
David:I'm someone who used to have gigantic fear about so many things.
David:I had huge difficulties in intimacy, in intimate relationships, and that was, that's kind of like a symbol, a symbol of the fear that I was carrying.
David:And I learned how to work through that.
David:That really sent me on a journey of trying to understand emotional healing, spirituality, what it is, what it means, how it helps us, who we really are.
David:And, and that, uh, that path is what lend ended up here and ended up having these other effects on my life.
David:So, so yeah, I, it was a, it was a roundabout way.
David:I mean, you know, when I, in college, I, I studied creative writing, and then I, when, after that, I went into advertising, then I went to business school to study leadership and social enterprise.
David:Then I, then I worked in social enterprise.
David:Then I left it because I, I saw all the, I saw that purpose wasn't the answer to business' problems, you know?
David:And then I, um, I realized in that, in that moment, I guess maybe the, the pivotal thing is, is after all that, I mean, I was like in my, I was in my thirties maybe I, and I decided to quit everything and give myself minimum of three months to, to not make another decision until I really figured out who I was.
David:And, and that's really when I saw why I wasn't happy, even with these successes that I had at why I wasn't happy, is because the, they were driven by fear.
David:They were still fear-based decisions.
David:And, uh, through fear-based decisions, you can accomplish a lot, but you're never gonna be happy doing it.
David:So I decided I'm not gonna make another decision based on fear.
David:I want my life to be run by love and joy.
David:And that's when I started consulting and started working with organizations on bringing more love into their leadership and their business.
David:And that led to working with people that led to the emotional healing journey that led to everywhere we are now and those other results I mentioned in my life.
David:So maybe that is answers your question.
Carlos:Thank you.
Carlos:No, I I think it illustrates very much the kind of a serendipitous path.
Carlos:There's something here around storytelling or writing or being express, being able to express yourself I think feels like a thread in, in what you were talking, but still the, the strategies around the work and what you did seems to be quite an emergent journey.
Carlos:And on and on that I was thinking this idea of connecting this willingness to go on an emergent path versus, this idea of fear, and how that, what play, how that plays a part in thinking linearly and thinking about, all right, going in one direction and certainty and,
Carlos:and then something that's less lesser and more emergent made me more joyful, but connected to this idea of fear, I dunno, just to, yeah.
David:Well, what you're making me think about is the, you know, how fear convinces us that it's the rational, logical choice.
David:And so we make usually the safe moves.
David:You know, these moves that we're supposed to make that seem like good, practical, logical decisions that we can make.
David:All kinds of arguments why it's the right decision to make.
David:And actually, if you're doing that a lot, that's usually actually fear behind those decisions.
David:So that's one thing you're making me think of when you say, you know, kind of the linear path versus an emergent path.
David:'Cause when you follow your excitement, you follow your joy, you literally have no idea where it's gonna go.
David:When I started doing improv, it was just an exercise in joy, and it still is.
David:I never expected it to lead to a, a, a dream of mine, which is to get an acting role.
David:You know, so, and it did.
David:So this is the kind of this, when you allow for the emergence and you allow yourself to be guided by something else than your fear, all kinds of really weird, interesting things happen to you that turn out.
David:Maybe it's what you wanted originally to begin with, but your mind's not gonna let you see that if you just do the rational thing.
David:Because the rational thing is never the most exciting thing hardly ever.
Laurence:we had this this morning.
Laurence:It came up quite a bit in this.
Laurence:We had the, the theme of the event this morning is midlife pivot, and in some ways trying to reframe the idea of a midlife crisis.
Laurence:'cause I think anyone who gets to a certain age thinks that if I change direction now, it's gonna be labeled as a crisis, and therefore it's just a stereotype of what happens when you get to your forties.
Laurence:And fear came up a lot because I think this fear of what other people think, and I think that's a big reason why people feel scared.
Laurence:But I also think there's element of, which a couple of people mentioned, fear of just opening yourself up to more from life.
Laurence:Fear of opening yourself up to good and bad emotions.
Laurence:Uh, fear of being vulnerable, fear of being judged because you're being vulnerable.
Laurence:And also fear of identity and that shifting and us evolving our relationship to ourself through life.
Laurence:And so on the surface, I think fear for a lot of people is, oh, I'm scared because I won't be earning money.
Laurence:I'm scared because other people might judge me.
Laurence:I'm scared because my parents think I'm reckless.
Laurence:But I think more and more I'm discovering that fear is actually about our relationship to ourself and our identity and actually just being vulnerable and how scary that can be.
Laurence:And David opening up on the call today for some people would be fear itself.
Laurence:Admitting that I'm scared is, is a huge thing.
David:Yeah.
David:many people, they just, they just think to themselves, you know.
David:I'm procrastinating.
David:I'm somehow self-sabotaging.
David:I'm just not letting myself pursue my dream.
David:Or they have this, they have, do you remember the movie Flashdance from like 1983?
David:How many, how many people raise hands?
David:I dunno if that's, if I'm dating, you know?
David:But I recently, I was too young to watch it when it came out, but I recently re-watched it, and there's this, you know, the main song from Flashdance.
David:There's this amazing lyric in that song where it's like the fear hides your dream in the back of your mind.
David:You know?
David:So some, some people just, they have this nagging sense that they're not doing what they're supposed to be doing.
David:They're not purpose, they're procrastinating on it.
David:May, maybe there's this dream that they can consciously articulate or maybe they can't, and it's in the back of their mind and they, and the fear is kind of hiding it.
David:And so some people might not even realize I'm scared.
David:They're just like, why don't my decisions feel good?
David:Like what?
David:Like what's happening to me?
David:Like why, why?
David:What is my, my dream like, isn't, where is my dream?
David:Why isn't it happening?
David:And I've, I've had these successes.
David:I don't feel fulfilled, like of course, of course not, because they've been rational successes.
David:And so actually what's going on is you're scared underneath.
David:There's just fear, just anxiety.
David:You're not letting yourself really go for the unreasonable thing that you know is in your heart.
David:And everybody that has actually gone for that unreasonable thing, you see them everywhere, that has gone for that unreasonable thing that's in their heart.
David:It, you know, no matter how it turns out, it's always better than the rational choice.
David:They never turn around and say, I regret that I did that.
David:But if you wanna get to that place where you take action on it, yeah, you need to do fear work.
David:You gotta work with the shadow that is your fear, that's the most direct way to, to resolve it.
David:It's not about like getting another better business plan or, you know, those things can sometimes help, you know, about getting better marketing strategy or something that maybe you feel more comfortable with or, or getting your first transaction, you know, in a, in a new business that can help you feel more comfortable for sure.
David:But the most direct way to not having the shadow of fear, kind of hiding your own dreams from yourself and stopping you from taking it, is to go directly and work with the fear itself.
Carlos:So I just had a question from, from Leanne saying, what makes the fear so strong?
David:Oh yeah, great question.
David:It's because your entire system is trying to survive.
David:Fear is the, is actually a very, in many situations, a very helpful mechanism to get you to survive.
David:The only, the reason you have fear as a, as a biological organism is because the, or the biological part of you feels like you are a separate individual alone in a dangerous world.
David:That is, that absolutely relies on the people around you to help you and support you and keep you safe.
David:And if you do anything to jeopardize any of that, you're in danger.
David:You might die.
David:And so your fear is literally thinks you will die if you do things like put a video online about your dream.
David:You're, you're, you're, the, the, the, the chain of the chain of causal like causality in the mind is like, I can't do that.
David:People will reject me.
David:If they reject me.
David:I'll be, you know, cast away.
David:If, if I'm cast away, I'll be alone and I'll then I'll be poor and I'll, I'll die alone in the gutter.
David:And, you know, one of, and that's literally the chain in your mind, it thinks it's your survival's at stake.
David:That's, that's kind of why, uh, Carlos was saying that maybe there's this idea that I talked about in the talk, like maybe you can feel your fear, but not believe, not believe that vision that the fear is holding in your head.
David:But, but the fear is very real and very visceral and very strong.
David:'cause it literally thinks your life is at stake.
Carlos:I wanted to add onto that.
Carlos:And it, it means I can also kind of like talk about my physics stays, which always makes me fear less that I wasted all of that time in the lab.
Carlos:But one of the, um, one of the things that I was taught when working with lots of numbers is because of the way our brains work, we spot visual contrast a lot easier than patterns in like letters or words.
Carlos:Well, we, we pattern recognition machines essentially.
Carlos:And so if you plot something out visually, you will see contrast or difference a lot easier, a lot more quickly.
Carlos:In the same way that if you have a white, plain white sheet, one little dot will stand out so much more than the kind of the plain whiteness of it.
Carlos:And that for me, there's some kind of neurological aspect of it, is like we will spot things that are just very different, very stark.
Carlos:And there's that, there's immediate reaction.
Carlos:So connecting to this idea of like spotting danger is like spotting difference.
Carlos:Spotting something that's not the same as normal is just a in-built thing.
Carlos:And so on one hand it's an amazing tool.
Carlos:I remember when I was trying to do my work, just being able to say, ah, I can see a pattern now because I can spot the differences, I can spot the changes, which is great.
Carlos:And at the same time it made me maybe very sensitive to change, which then had an emotional impact.
Carlos:And that's what I'm connecting now in my brain of like being someone who's rationally driven, using that ability to spot change as a tool, and also how that ingrained my sensitivity to change around.
David:It's like our brain has this mechanism that's like, I'm surviving right now, so any change might be bad.
David:it's like, why, why do people, why would someone stay in an abusive relationship?
David:Why would their emo their system be so, like emotionally?
David:Why, why would that, why would there be enough energy for them that that actually keeps them in an abusive relationship?
David:I mean, I'm not gonna go into some deep therapeutic discussion right now, but one factor is that the relationship is they're, they're, they're surviving despite how horrible it might be.
David:Their system knows well, they're alive and actually breaking outta that is an unknown.
David:And the unknown means could be death.
David:So, so your system is, is like on a certain level, not willing to take that risk.
Carlos:And so on that.
Carlos:Now, if we, so there's believing the fear and believing what the fear might bring, which is potentially death, what in your, from your perspective, has helped you with that scenario?
David:Embracing the fear, actually fully, totally learning how to totally accept and welcome the fear into me and into my body.
David:Instead of having a be shadow force, hiding in the background, constantly trying to rationalize my decisions, constantly trying to get me to do stuff.
David:I look directly at it and I welcome it.
David:I hug it like an old friend, and I bring it into me and into my heart.
David:And it, sometimes it makes me cry.
David:Sometimes it makes me shake, sometimes it makes, creates gigantic knots in my stomach, but my fear is just my system trying to, having some story of how I might not survive and what's dangerous.
David:And when I bring that closer to me, bring, come closer to me, come closer to me.
David:Let me feel you completely.
David:What is, what are you, what is the real thought here?
David:What is the real thing being imagined here?
David:What am I really afraid will happen?
David:I get that closer and closer and I feel it all the way with my body all the way in.\
David:And what you find when you do practices like this is that it starts to dissolve, it starts to get lighter.
David:It's when it, when you start to pay attention to it and welcome it, it starts to drop its urgency.
David:Its message starts to get looser.
David:You start to have some space around it.
David:You, there's some other energy comes in, like some excitement or some joy can come in or all of a sudden you see a situation differently.
David:I mean, it's, it's quite incredible when you do this type of practice, the, these like embodied emotional, embracing and acceptance practices.
David:It's quite shocking when you first start about how all of a sudden your thoughts change by themselves.
David:You haven't done any work on your thoughts, but you just do the work with the emotion and all of a sudden you have different thoughts about a scenario, about what you're capable of, about who you are, about actions you have, solutions you're coming up with.
David:Just new things appear like a new perspective is all of a sudden available.
David:And you realize how many of your thoughts are actually kind of controlled or the reflection of with the emotions that are going on underneath.
David:So when you, when you work with those emotions directly, you can create huge shifts in you, your, your being state, which changes what you see, which changes how you decide, which changes how you express yourself, which changes how you act, which completely changes the results around you.
Carlos:So what I'm connecting to was some of the stuff that we would talk about, uh, early days within the Happy Startup School community, working with people, starting new things and, and getting creative.
Carlos:This phrase of getting comfortable with being uncomfortable, which I fucking hated, 'cause it's just like, what's the most oxymoronic sentence in the world?
Carlos:Just didn't make sense.
Carlos:I, I get what the sentiment is, but the thing is, there was, what someone wasn't explaining to me was like, discomfort is not bad.
David:Yes.
Carlos:That's the thing that wasn't explained to me is like discomfort isn't something I need to judge as something I need to push away or not go near.
Carlos:Uh, it is a, an experience, but it isn't, something that I've done wrong.
David:And, and discomfort just like fear, it's a motivational mechanism by your system to try to get you to do something, to fix the situation, to get out of it, to, to survive, you know?
David:So discomfort is your, your brain's automatic reaction to discomfort is, oh, there's a problem.
David:So exactly what you just said is one of the biggest first spaces of freedom we can create in ourselves is when we realize discomfort's not a problem.
David:Discomfort doesn't mean there's a problem.
David:Discomfort just means there's a process happening.
David:That is, uh, that that can create huge space.
David:Because if you can, if you can welcome your discomfort, you can do all kinds of things.
David:The only reason you're not already acting and speaking and expressing and doing it, the things that you know in your heart you could be doing and creating what you know you could be creating, the only reason is because on some level, there's this, there is this discomfort, this emotional discomfort in the form of usually fear.
David:And there are three kind of, I think three areas where those fears are the strongest.
David:It's literally, it's just your nervous system trying to motivate you to, to fix, fix something.
David:And the discomfort is one way of doing that.
David:You know, it makes you hungry so it gets you to eat, you know, being hungry is like uncomfortable, you know?
David:It makes you thirsty.
David:It get you to get you to drink.
David:It's the same at at, at some level with emotions.
David:It's making you scared to get you to do something.
Laurence:I seem to remember that line, being comfortable.
Laurence:Being comfortable was like a rollercoaster was the metaphor.
Laurence:Some people love rollercoasters was the theory, and some people hate them.
Laurence:It's the same experience.
Laurence:It's how you interpret that, uh, experience affects your experience of it.
Laurence:It's a bit like embrace failure.
Laurence:Embrace uncertainty.
Laurence:You learn to love it.
Laurence:I think that that's part of the metaphor, isn't it?
Laurence:It's part of the zeitgeist.
Laurence:Ticking the Startup world is, you know, fail fast.
Laurence:It's a badge of honor.
Laurence:It's a good thing.
Laurence:Go g, go do it.
Laurence:Go seek failure.
Laurence:I don't know if anyone ever loves failure, even people who fail a lot.
Laurence:I think it, it's, that needs a rebrand in some ways.
Laurence:But it is that thing of trying not to judge and trying not to in some ways, owning it, not living that.
Laurence:So if something doesn't work, it's not you, it's the thing trying to detach your identity and your self-worth from something you've tried.
Laurence:And I think that's what a lot of people make the mistake of is they tie everything and it's so binary that, this discomfort is, 'cause I try it and it either works a hundred percent or it fails a hundred percent and therefore I'm a failure if it fails.
David:But how do you learn to love that?
David:'Cause, 'cause what you just described, failure.
David:Failure is just a feeling, right?
David:Like, how can you, are you objectively, how can you, you can't even make an objective definition of failure because like, let's say someone, let's say someone fails at their job, right?
David:Quote unquote fails at their job and gets fired.
David:Then it turns out that was the best thing that ever happened to them 'cause then they started like working on what they really loved.
David:Or let's say someone takes a big experiment with their entrepreneurial journey and then it fails, but then they learn something that completely changes their life or whatever.
David:Like we can't even, we don't even know what failure is on from an external objective perspective.
David:But what we do know it is, is how it feels and we hate to feel it.
David:So actually the, the way to love failing is to learn how to love your feelings.
David:That's the how for me.
David:Yeah.
David:Oh, there's some good quotes in here.
David:Like, uh, you must get addicted to uncomfortable action to succeed.
David:You know, that's an interesting Yeah.
David:Interesting idea.
David:Yeah.
David:Like, if you could be, if you could like, love the discomfort of taking a new action, you would create so much so fast.
Laurence:Hmm.
David:What else?
David:That, when the fear of leaving is better is bigger than the fear of staying, Beth is saying.
David:Yeah, it can get like, or actually, that, that can happen.
David:It kind of, I think of it as a reverse as well where, where like the need to do something, the excitement and impulse to do something just, just ends up becoming greater than the fear stopping you from doing it.
Laurence:Yeah.
David:That happened to me with standup.
David:That happened to me with standup.
David:And I got there specifically with emotional work.
David:I found incredible amounts of shame in my body that was preventing me from, uh, getting on stage and doing standup.
David:And I did straight up, deep down emotional work with that shame.
David:I was crying, I was shaking, I was like, I had this super intense session.
David:And then, uh, like something I'd been wanting to do for years after that session, I mean, there was other, there was other work building up to it, but I'd been wanting to do stand up for years and then after that session, uh, three days later, I book myself on an open bike for the first time ever.
Carlos:That this whole, uh, well, this whole idea and relationship to failure and I think we're connecting it to fear.
Carlos:The thing that's bringing up for me is like, when I think of the word fail, the first thing I think about is failing an exam, failing a test, failing, uh, to achieve a benchmark that has been set.
Carlos:So this idea, like, if you don't hit this, uh, level, however that's defined numerically or, or in someone's someone else's definition or even your own definition of, of, uh, hitting a, a target, then you failed.
Carlos:And so then because of that, you're not good enough.
Carlos:And then this sense of like, if I'm not good enough, I'm not worth it, I'm not valuable.
Carlos:So there's whole kind of trickle down idea around it.
Carlos:And I was trying to tell also, look up what's the, where's the origin of the word failure?
Carlos:Where does it come from?
Carlos:And one of it, one of the origins is from the word Latin, which means to fall.
Carlos:So if you fall and you get yourself up again, that makes sense.
Carlos:It doesn't mean you're not gonna reach a thing, it's just you just fell along the way.
Carlos:You tripped.
Carlos:Something just like got in your way.
Carlos:But, and all of us, when we fall, it hurts.
Carlos:It's painful, but it doesn't mean we don't get up again.
Carlos:But somehow when we fail, we don't want to get up again.
Carlos:'cause it means if we fail again, what does that mean?
Carlos:And
David:I feel that, but I think that's pretty rare though, right?
David:That's pretty rare that someone actually fails and doesn't get up again.
David:Like most people, when they fail, they, they have new energy.
David:If they fail at something they, they cared about, they have new energy to try again.
David:And that usually, that story of failure and what they learn propels them, right, into the next journey.
David:It's only our brain that thinks the failure is gonna be some, some type of end.
David:You are, you know, it's only, it's only our mind that thinks it's gonna be some type of end.
Carlos:I, no, I agree.
Carlos:But I, well I would also say there are many people and friends and relatives who are scared of failing and they failed once and they won't try again.
Carlos:Yes.
Carlos:Yeah, they, they failed, uh, I don't know, opening the beer bubble.
Carlos:I'll try again at that.
David:Yeah.
Carlos:But maybe they failed at um, starting their own little shop.
Carlos:I'm never gonna go back there.
Carlos:'cause you know, that was so embarrassing and it was so painful.
Carlos:And I'm not good enough for doing that stuff, so I'm never gonna do that.
David:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
David:Or like in relationships, you know, you have a relationship, you get super burned and then you feel like you can't trust anybody.
David:You know, you won't want to try one of those relationships again.
David:Yeah.
David:I mean, um, okay.
David:Again, for me, the way through that is at the emotional level.
David:Because the reason you're not doing it is 'cause how uncomfortable it feels for you.
Laurence:Hmm.
David:You feel like you're not good enough, you feel like really wronged, or you feel like it's not possible for me.
David:I can't ever get this, you know, I can't ever make this happen.
David:Those are all internal being states.
David:Those are all emotions at their root.
David:So for me, again, the way through that, to actually find the place where I'm comfortable trying again, is to first process all the emotions I have about that first, that first time.
David:If someone fails on something they care about and they never try again, to me that that means in this scenarios we're talking about it means they have unprocessed emotions.
David:They've never been able to integrate those emotions, so they can't move forward yet.
David:So again, for me it's the emotional work.
David:And there are a couple interesting questions here.
David:I don't know if we wanna get to.
Laurence:I was curious about Frances' one actually about how do you personally make decisions?
David:I try to make decisions exclusively on my love and joy.
David:So it's a feeling inside.
David:It's a feeling of expansion.
David:It's a feeling of freedom.
David:It's a feeling of excitement.
David:It's a feeling of like chains coming off.
David:It's a feeling of, uh, lifting.
David:It's a feeling of widening.
David:It's a feeling of, uh, yeah, of passion.
David:All it's, it's that I'm looking for one of those things versus a feeling of constraint, a feeling of constriction, a feeling of heaviness, a feeling of um, I should do something or a feeling of I have to, or what is my fear trying to get me to do and looking directly at what am I afraid of?
David:You know?
David:So I'm trying to, I try to parse what's going on in my system first by looking at it directly and clearly., and then I'm trying to find that sense of expansion.
David:Some might call it your highest excitement.
David:You might call it your love.
David:You might call it your joy, what your heart wants.
David:You might call it your intuition.
David:You might call it like, I often do guidance from your higher self.
David:'Cause I don't believe your joy and what you love is a coincidence.
David:I believe those, those gigantic, like bursting, expansive feelings in your heart about what your heart, you know, yearns for in a, in a positive way, i, I think those are coming from the deepest level of you that we don't even understand how to talk about yet.
David:We don't know what even fully is yet.
David:And that is, uh, so that's a message.
David:So that's how I try to make decisions.
David:And, um, I have, you know, various techniques I use to make, make it more clear for myself if I'm having trouble getting a handle on those feelings.
Laurence:I'm just curious, is there a danger with that where you can trick yourself into thinking that this is from a place of love or joy, or you've had that in the past where there's a rational move, but you've gone, no, actually this is, this is an expansive move and actually look back
Laurence:and regretted it or I think, like Chris mentioned earlier, this idea that if we make decisions outta fear, will it always end up in a, a bad ending?
David:Yeah.
David:No, I don't think so.
David:I don't think so.
David:Because you can, you can use any, everything for your growth.
David:You can use everything to turn into a positive outcome for yourself.
David:And that doesn't mean like, look at rose tinted glasses with everything.
David:It means like, let's say, you know, you have a, let's say you have some terrible loss in your life.
David:You know, even going through the, going through the emotions and the healing that can come from that and the new perspectives that that can come from, that, that can turn into a positive for you.
David:And it, it's not about like from, it's not about being like, everything's okay.
David:No, it's not about that.
David:It's about actually going into the depth of the pain and then it can turn into a positive for you.
David:So e if even if you, you make a very fear-based, rational decision, you didn't do anything wrong, you still can turn that into a huge positive for yourself.
Laurence:We're very good at convincing ourselves why we're making a decision and it's for the right reasons and.
David:Yes.
Laurence:I think you are pretty skilled given your experience and work to know the difference between what that feels like as an expansive decision from a place of love or joy or, actually, this is my head talking.
Laurence:For example I'm taking this opportunity because the money's good, and actually I've convinced myself that actually it's, I'm excited by this and I'm excited by the result, the end goal, or I'm excited by just the thought of moving into this project or collaboration?
David:Yeah.
David:What you're talking about was one of the most shocking things to me when I started studying, you know, psychology more closely.
David:And Dan Ire, is a behavioral economist and psychologist who has tons of really cool Ted talks about this phenomenon.
David:But it's the phenomenon that most of our rational thinking, like 99% of it is actually rationalization of some type of inner impulse we have.
David:You know, oh yeah, I should take this job.
David:Yeah, yeah.
David:It's, it's gonna be good money and yeah, I'll like it.
David:And it's new people and, and like, oh, it's gonna be good for my career and, and all that stuff, that's rationalization.
David:And, and what you gotta look into is, well, wait, what is the emotional energy behind this decision?
David:You know, am I taking it because, like, what is, it actually is the emotion behind this decision my heart joy, my love, my expansion, my, my belief in what I'm truly capable of and my truth, or is the emotional and energy behind this decision is like, yeah, this makes sense and, you know, I need the money and, and like, I don't wanna, all the other, the other options seem more scary, you know?
David:So I'm gonna do this one.
David:And it, it's very easy to convince ourselves, very easy to convince ourselves.
David:And I've done it many times.
David:I still do it on certain occasions.
David:I still do it, you know, I like, uh, in different little decisions in my life or different places in my life.
David:But fortunately right now, I think I'm at a place where for all the big decisions, you know, like all the big decisions that have formed the, you know, the main structure of my life, where I live, what I work on, who I'm with, you know, whether we're having a kid or not, you know, all those
David:things, those big decisions all have come from me just doing what my heart told me to do and not listening to my, to anything my head said about it.
David:Literally not listening to any of the thoughts, letting the thoughts happen, but not listening to any of them.
David:Oh, but this might happen, but that might happen, but what if this happens?
David:No, it doesn't matter.
David:I can't, I've, I've learned enough that those do not matter.
Carlos:Sort of following on from what you said with Dan Alia's work about post-rationalization, why in your opinion, do we post rationalize?
David:Oh, that's just the, the brain's, the brain wanting to have like a reality that makes sense to it.
David:That's it.
David:So like.
Carlos:And what does it mean to make sense?
Carlos:That's a curious thing.
David:Well, okay, so let's say, let's say like, let's say you have this internal fear of working for yourself and some new job opportunity comes along, right?
David:And then you start to rational.
David:So there's, there's this fear of like, okay, right now I could quit and just try working for myself where I could take this new job opportunity.
David:And you're scared to quit and start your new thing, you know.
David:So your brain is like, starts to make these rationalizations, oh, the new job is good money, it's good people be great for my career, blah, blah, blah.
David:All your brain is doing is trying to give the fear like a legitimacy.
David:'Cause there's this energy in the nervous system and the brain is like, yes, this makes sense because XY Z, blah, blah, blah.
David:You know, so it's just trying to, it's just trying to translate the energy in the system into something that it thinks it makes sense.
David:That's exactly what dreams are by the way, you know.
David:When we all this electrical activity that happens at night, nobody exactly knows like what ex what's going on.
David:But we do know that your dream actually takes shape in the few minutes and seconds before you wake up.
David:This is well documented in science now.
David:So like right before you, you wake up, your brain looks at the electrical activity that happened, and then it come, and then it like makes images and symbols and it tries to put a, it puts a story together to make sense of what just happened in your mind.
David:That's the same thing with rationalization.
David:It's there's this emotional energy coming through, there's this impulse coming through and it's either from your fear or it could be even from your higher self.
David:And your brain is, is like, oh, this, yes, this makes sense because XY Z, 'cause your brain wants to live in a world that that thinks makes sense to it, you know, otherwise it's like, it gets very, gets very terrified, gets very terrified encountering things that just literally don't make sense.
Carlos:And I think that's what I wanted to get to there, was this rationalization is, uh, again, another way to address the fear.
Carlos:So we choose this job rather than doing the thing on our own or train that less clear path through one of better term.
Carlos:And then, so to avoid us feeling ashamed or regret, uh, or to explain it to people around us, why we did this thing, even though we've been saying we wanna do the other thing, we create this rationalization, we create these stories, we create these, I was gonna say making sense.
Carlos:It's like making personal sense.
Carlos:Making personal coherence.
Carlos:No, it's a good thing to do.
Carlos:It's a good thing to do.
Carlos:It's, it's, I haven't failed by not doing that thing, 'cause I did, I succeeded by choosing this.
David:And then you tell it to other people and most other people are like, yeah, that makes sense.
David:You know?
David:Yeah, that's true.
David:You know, and they're just trying to be supportive.
David:But really a better question would be like well, how are you feeling about it in your body?
Laurence:Mm-Hmm.
David:What does your body do when you think about taking this new job?
David:What do you feel in your stomach?
David:What do you feel in your heart?
David:Why don't you stand up right now and take the body position that shows me how you really feel about taking this job.
David:You know?
David:And it might be like, like a, like, eh, this is pretty good.
David:Yeah, okay.
David:So why don't you stand up and stand up and show me the body position of how you would love to feel in your life.
David:Like, oh, like, oh, you know, like this.
David:Well, does your job match that?
David:No.
David:Well, what?
David:What would match this then?
David:Do that and forget what your mind is telling you.
Laurence:Skydiving.
David:Yeah.
Carlos:But this leads me onto this, another thing that cropped up when you're talking about the objectivity and subjectivity.
Carlos:In terms of I as a scientist in training, like there's this thing, this search for an objective reality.
Carlos:These rules that govern things no matter what.
Carlos:You know, we talk about gravity, we talk about some of these rules of physics, we talk about economic systems, we talk about, you know, supply and demand.
Carlos:We, we create these rules around how the world works, that feels that everyone can agree about.
Carlos:And then there's this other part that you are talking about, this feeling based approach to the world, which is so subjective, which is so hard for anyone to necessarily understand because it's such a personal experience.
Carlos:And so I say, oh, I wanna do this.
Carlos:I feel expanse.
Carlos:Or, you know, I, I basically, I go with a feeling, but I can't explain it to anyone else, because they're not me and they're not in my body and they're not experiencing what I'm experiencing.
Carlos:And so they will question my decision based on their own view on the world.
Carlos:And so there on one hand, I, you know, I'm, what I'm trying to get at is for people who, like a, needing to get in touch with their feelings, but then also in a sense kind of protecting that knowing, not being, how do you basically stand firm in those feelings?
David:Yeah.
David:Great, great, great, great question.
David:For me, the way it worked and the way I guide people, my clients to do it is start with small things that don't have high stakes.
David:And prove to yourself that this is a valid, helpful, productive, expansive, successful way to make decisions.
David:And when you prove to yourself that your joy works and will take care of you and will lead you into really interesting situations and your excitement will positively surprise you and bring you things your brain didn't even think you could have, when you, when you learn that this, that this guidance is in you and you can do it, when you prove that to yourself, that's when you can stand firm in it.
David:So you're not gonna prove it, you're not gonna be able to stand firm by just listening to me or, or any of these ideas.
David:You have to just go, go try it for yourself.
David:You know, don't, don't take my word for it.
David:And start with small stuff.
David:That's what I did.
David:You know, I started with small things like, I wanna, I'm gonna go to that cafe, how am I gonna get there?
David:Walk tram, you know, like metro?
David:Like something really small like that.
David:And then I would, I would try to feel my excitement.
David:I would try to feel my expansion and it would be like, oh, I feel like walking.
David:And lo and behold, what do you know?
David:I run into one of my friends on the way, you know, stuff like that happens all the time.
David:So these are, this is like small.
David:Small experiments to start out, and then you do, then you start, then maybe like me, you'll, you'll choose where you, what country you live in, and you, you,.
Carlos:Well, I think this is really useful.
Carlos:Um, mm.
Carlos:Particularly given today.
Carlos:'cause one of the things, the challenges that was floated by, uh, one, some of the attendees that Ideas Cafe is having too many options.
Carlos:Too many business decision options, too many product idea options, too many, basically a whole range of things that they could do and being paralyzed by trying to know which one to take.
Carlos:And so it feels like being able to intuitively decide whether to walk, take the tram or get a lift can help if you build that skill up to then decide, do I start out on my own or do I go back to that job?
Carlos:Do I create a product, a service, an event, and that, or how do I move forward despite having not having all the information?
Laurence:Basically get good at making decisions.
David:Yeah.
David:You're never gonna have all the information ever.
Laurence:No.
David:There's always more information you could have.
David:So if, if, you know, if you rely, and maybe, maybe there's some threshold of information you could cross where you start to get overwhelmed, where you're just like, I have to make a decision.
David:But if, you know, if you have, like, if you have three, four or five 10 options in front of you, here's another exercise if you want it, you know.
David:Just write them down on a piece of paper and literally rate each one on a scale of one to 10 in terms of your joy, in terms of your heart's excitement and sense of expansion.
David:Just rate each one.
David:There's only, there's, there's gonna be a clear winner.
David:You know, your, your heart, your heart's guidance in any moment is quite specific.
David:You know, it's, it's when you're able to feel it, it's quite clear.
David:There's always one thing that it's like a yes, this is the, yes, the, you know, this is the most Yes.
David:And if, if you have a bunch of options and they're all kind of tied.
David:That means either you maybe, uh, you need to open your sensitivity.
David:Maybe with help you can open your sensitivity and feel more deeply.
David:Or you haven't found your real Yes.
David:Yet.
David:You just haven't named it yet.
David:But there, your heart will guide you.
Carlos:So one of the things that I've, um, heard and experienced is this idea of heightening the sensitivity..
Carlos:For people who have been, who have made a success in inverted commas, out being hyper rational, and really, you know, looking at all the angles, especially being chest, like with their approach to life.
Carlos:There is a, a judgment.
Carlos:There's not only a resistance, there's a judgment about following a feeling or trusting a feeling.
Carlos:And because of that, to send a extent, just being totally cut off from this idea of even having feelings, right?
Carlos:So I just, in.
Carlos:In that situation, when you talk about, uh, heard you talk about it being sensitive or sensitizing yourself, have you helped anyone or what would you get someone to do to start a, removing that judgment and b, practicing that this, this, this aspect of themselves?
David:Yeah.
David:the, the first, the first place to turn, it's the, it's the, it's the most beautiful, magical, mysterious, fantastic, interesting, grounded, practical tool you have.
David:And that's your body.
David:You have to spend time going into your body.
David:Put your hands on your body.
David:What are, what are the sensations inside your body?
David:Where is the tension?
David:What's inside there?
David:You have to let yourself sit with your body, get quiet.
David:Nothing.
David:In silence.
David:And feel the body get into the body, you know.
David:And that, that process, yes, there are all these positive outcomes we've been talking about, and that process will bring up more discomfort.
David:It's something everybody who go down, goes down this path needs to deal with.
David:As you become more sensitive to what your love and joy is, you also become more sensitive to your pain.
David:And, uh, Brene Brown talks about this, it's like a bandwidth, you know, when you, when you expand your capacity for feeling, you're expanding both sides of the spectrum.
David:You're expanding both the difficult stuff and the positive stuff.
David:So you, you might get to a point like I, you know, have experienced where I have, you know, I'm crying heavily for an hour, you know, and then later that day or the next day, I am, I have a spontaneous moment of being absolutely in love with life, and feeling like the perfection of the universe and tears of joy coming down my face for no reason.
David:So you, you, you expand this, you, you, you're expanding your whole bandwidth.
David:And one of the hardest things for people to deal with when they embark on this work is they start to feel worse sometimes.
David:And they think something wrong is happening.
David:They think I'm not doing it right.
David:I should be feeling better.
David:Isn't that what this spirituality thing?
David:Isn't that what this emotional healing thing is?
David:Isn't that what this self-awareness thing is all about?
David:Is feeling better?
David:Well, actually, actually, yes, but as you have those moments of feeling really better, also there's gonna be moments where you feel some of the depth of the pain that's still in there.
David:And that's, and those moments are gonna feel worse.
David:But the thing is, what you learn is those always pass.
David:They are not a problem and they always pass.
David:They are not permanent.
David:Tho those feelings inside you do not last forever.
David:They, it's a finite amount of energy stuck in your system.
David:And if you just stick with it and work with it, it will inevitably be done.
David:So that's the good news.
Carlos:I connected back to this idea of contrast.
Carlos:And for me, in a way, this is how I'm processing it, is like if I think about, um, valleys and and hills.
Carlos:So there's this way of living where it is just nice little smooth, bumps where there's not much difference between the high and the low.
Carlos:And then what you're talking about increasing your bandwidth is yes, you might deepen the lows because you get really sensitive to all the feelings.
Carlos:But also you increasing the highs, which means what was just a little wiggle becomes potentially these massive changes that you can experience.
Carlos:And as, um, Beth says, being fully life living, the full bandwidth of experience, the, what that leads me to is like being scared of success because if I'm successful at feeling all the feels, that's gonna be so uncomfortable.
Carlos:So maybe I don't do it.
David:Well, that's what, that's what your, your mind might say right now.
David:But actually, even though you might be having these highs and lows, you spend much more time in the highs.
David:And even though you're having these highs and lows, the lows become much, much more easier to deal with and they're short.
Laurence:Hmm.
David:Because you learn how to work with them.
David:So overall, it's like an upward, upward trend, you know?
David:So overall it's like, it's like an angle like this, but with like lots of ups and downs like that, you know, but it's, it's, it's trending upward.
Carlos:I love a squiggly graph that goes up.
David:Yeah, yeah.
David:It's an upward, it's an upward trending squiggly graph.
David:Uh, and, so yeah, and it is, and you do start feeling more fully alive.
Laurence:Mm-Hmm.
David:And overall, you start feeling better because you realize you're being more true to yourself.
David:And then like you, you, let's say you look at like, you know, some advertisement on YouTube of like an animal being abused, you know, or like, and they're trying to get your, get you to donate, or like a child who's hungry and needs medical attention and your heart just breaks open and you just like, feel tears coming.
David:And you realized that's how you actually felt about it all along.
David:But you held that in.
David:You didn't let yourself feel it.
David:But then you, you, you let yourself feel it fully and yeah, it's uncomfortable and the tears come, but then afterward you feel oh yeah, I, I'm, that was, that was the true me.
David:I feel more alive and I feel more empowered to do something, and I feel more capable of letting my excitement lead me into how I can help.
David:And you trust that.
Carlos:we are coming, towards the end and I just wanted to tackle the question before we close, and it's from Andreas, and he's asking you, David, how do you deal with people in your environment or circle who don't get you or even scare you and feed your fear?
David:I wanna also, um, before I forget, uh, Beth had a really good question.
David:How, what's a technique you can use to work with a body if you have deep trauma in the body?
David:Uh, there are many, but the one that has worked, worked the best for me and I got certified in it.
David:It's called Havening.
David:Uh.
David:You can look it up online, havening.org.
David:It's a direct body focused technique on helping you release, uh, trauma and emotional energy in the body.
David:And, um, on my website, I have some, I mean, there are havening practitioners all over the world.
David:You can find lots of free resources on YouTube.
David:And also on my website, you can apply to have a gift session from me.
David:And if that's what you wanna experience in the gift session, we can focus on that.
David:So I'm just letting you know as well.
David:Um, and to, to the other question about, uh, what about people around you don't get you?
David:That's always gonna be the case.
David:And the more and more you follow your truth, probably the less and less people will get you, because they can't see inside you, kind of what Carlos was saying.
David:And they may feed your fear.
David:You know, I remember one time, uh, you know, when I, when I decided to quit everything, like all those jobs I had, the last place I was fully employed and I decided to do nothing for three months to find what was really in my heart and actually act on that, one of my friends, you know.
David:He didn't get it at all.
David:And he said, well, how are you gonna explain that gap on your resume?
David:You know, how are you gonna explain?
David:And I mean, this was back, this was back in, you know, 2000 and, uh, what, like 2013?
David:So it was like, you know, it was a little bit, maybe a little bit different world even back then.
David:But, you know, the funny thing is, is I've never had to use a resume since.
David:Like, those are the kind of things that like happen, you know what I mean?
David:So there are gonna be people around you that are like, what about this?
David:What about that?
David:What's going on here?
David:What you have to realize is that they're speaking from their own fear.
David:It doesn't have have anything to do with you.
David:You can listen to what they say and you can see how you feel about it.
David:And if it brings up fear in you, that's just some emotional work for you to absorb.
David:That's just some emotions for you to sit within your body.
David:It does not have to decide your actions for you.
David:If there's one thing you know people are gonna leave with today, let the fear happen.
David:It's not a problem.
David:Feel the fear.
David:Let the thoughts happen.
David:They're not a problem.
David:Just, just don't let that fear decide what you say and do.
David:Just let it be there as a friend trying to help you along the way.
David:But it doesn't get to drive the bus.
David:So that's what you, when people around you, you know, and how to deal with them, well, I don't try to force anyone on the path that I'm on.
David:I don't try to force anyone to like, to understand me.
David:You know, I let them have their own path, their own perspective.
David:I ask them questions.
David:I take a coaching approach with those people.
David:I get really curious about what they're feeling, who they are, and I just try to model me being me.
David:That is the biggest influence and best teaching I can have.
David:Just model me being me.
David:And then if they're interested, they will, they'll ask me about more information, they'll come closer to me and I'll be able to help them more.
David:But you know, tho those situations, those people in your life, they're also not a problem.
David:You don't need to change them and you don't need to change yourself.
David:Just sit with whatever's arising.
David:Welcome that, and you will feel your way through.
Carlos:Well soon.
Carlos:Thank you very much, David.
Carlos:That is, um.
Laurence:Love, love idea.
Laurence:Dave David driving the Fear bus.
David:Somebody, maybe somebody can drive
Laurence:on board
David:on the car.
Laurence:Yeah.
Carlos:Well, thank you.
Laurence:Thanks David.
Carlos:Um, thank you everyone who's listening.
Carlos:Uh, before we close, is there any, anywhere or anything that you would like to point people to?
David:Well, um, of course there's my website, which is davidpapa.live.
David:You can learn more about me and unconditional coaching there.
David:And, uh, yeah, very shortly I'll have the, the application for the, the gift session ready 'cause I'm changing it a little bit.
David:And, um, and also I want to, um, I want to create a resource soon about these three main fears that I, I think, uh, I think it's just worth everybody hearing, which is separation, scarcity, and shame.
David:And those are the three ones.
David:And if you can make, if you can give yourself progress in any one of those areas, you'll make a huge, you make a huge leap for yourself.
David:Um, two of those areas would be flying high.
David:So, uh, that's one place they would, they, they can look, um, definitely check out Dana Re's work if you're interested in this whole rationalization thing and how we actually make decisions.
David:Uh, it's actually a very subconscious, emotional based thing.
David:Um, yeah, get into that.
David:But, uh, reach out to me if you want more books or resources about this kind of thing.
David:'cause I mean, this is, this is my life.
David:I, I love this kind of thing.
David:Especially the, the higher self discussion and the spiritual component of that.
David:I just, I'm so energized by that stuff.
David:Or if you wanna just, uh, write jokes with me, you know, reach out because that's also something I love, uh, so, some jokes about it.
Carlos:Thank you David.
Carlos:And, um, anything else you wanna leave people with final thoughts, reflections on this whole conversation?
David:Yeah, just thank you so much for you both, both of you, you know, Carlos and Laurence for hosting these conversations and inviting me on.
David:And thank you everybody who is here listening.
David:And I get that what's coming up in answer to your question is you are already, this is for everybody.
David:You are already the unconditional, courageous, powerful, excited, joyful, loving, passionate creator.
David:You are already that it's there inside you.
David:You don't have to gain anything.
David:You don't have to get a new course.
David:It's all there already.
David:The only thing that can possibly stop you from expressing that is letting the fear run your life.
Laurence:Mm-Hmm.
David:So just work with the fear and that other stuff will come out naturally and it will shock you and surprise you what you're capable of.
Laurence:I feel like I need a 32nd David Papa on my phone every morning to, to hear that message.
Laurence:Um, what am I leaving with?
Laurence:I think just this idea that there's a fear of feeling and yeah, it's not about an outcome or a judgment, it's just about feeling all the feels and to not try and shy away from that, but just go with it.
Laurence:So, um, yeah, when you were talking, it made me think of grief and death and actually how those moments of grief are when we laugh the most, as well as cry the most.
Laurence:And a lot of people are scared of death and that stops 'em doing things in life.
Laurence:So, yeah.
Laurence:Thanks for that reminder.
Carlos:What's, what's most.
Carlos:clear to me at the moment is getting to a stage in life where you've attached a lot of stuff to yourself, whether there's responsibility or achievement or identity as we heard this morning.
Carlos:And so we kind of like you saying we, we know a lot of the stuff we need to know or there's, there's like tactics and strategies and things we need skills that we think we need to know.
Carlos:But what feels like the most important thing is that self knowledge bit.
Carlos:You know, what is it scaring us?
Carlos:What is the fear telling us?
Carlos:Or what is the fear?
Carlos:Where's the fear actually coming from really, rather than what's happening right now?
Carlos:Maybe there's something else, like, I'm really curious about the whole, the pro.
Carlos:What are you not processing in that situation.
Carlos:When someone says, oh, you shouldn't do that, and you're like, oh, like, is it them or is it you?
Carlos:And if it's you, what is it really that's happening?
Carlos:That, that feels like quite important thing for people, well, at least for me to consider, but I believe from a lot of people who are in our community who follow up our work.
Carlos:You know your stuff already, you know, you are not, not naive little kids, you, but there's something else that's maybe missing.
Carlos:So yeah, really value your work.
Carlos:They will really value provocations around this.
Carlos:And also the, the energy you bring to it, which also makes this a bit more palatable than some people may feel.
David:Thanks.
David:Thanks very much and congrats to you all you guys for doing this amazing work you're doing for 10 years.
David:10 years.
Laurence:Mm-Hmm.
David:So that's a fantastic milestone.
Laurence:there's a certain moment of your talk, which when I look back over this 10 years will stand in my mind.
Laurence:So thanks for that.
Laurence:If you haven't seen David talk, you go and watch it.
David:Yeah, it is edited though.
David:I went, I went too far, evidently in Summercamp.
Carlos:It was edited.
Carlos:I was really disappointed by the edited.
Carlos:So I'm gonna have, get the unedited version and share it with our community.
Carlos:Director's cut.
Carlos:Anyway, with that mysterious comment in mind, thank you very much, David.
Carlos:Thank you everyone.
Carlos:Have a great weekend.
David:Thank you.
Carlos:Good rest of your Friday, and until next week, bye-Bye.
Laurence:Take care everyone.
