Wednesday, July 25, 2007

What If

If we are startled or in a harmful situation we react and respond immediately. No hesitation just reaction. It is afterward that we get the shakes become afraid when speculating on what could have happened. We mark the key elements we should pay attention to such as stepping off the curb without looking and determine what we will do in the future to prevent the situation from occurring again. Check first.

When does fear occur?

All fear begins with 'what if'. We speculate about the future and play what if games. Certainly we need to look at potential problems and determine whether they will have an impact and more importantly what is the possibility of them occurring.

What we need to understand is everything about the future is predictive. It is our guess about what might or might not happen. We need to use common sense and not fear as our guide.

If our 'what if' gets out of hand then we can paralyze ourselves by fear rather than counting on our ability to adapt and modify to meet actual events. After all  haven't we been doing that all our lives.

Your thoughts?

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6 conversations:

Sandee said...

Yes, I would say most of us have been doing that all our lives. Some of the best laid plans just don't work out for one reason or another. Move on to plan B or C or D if necessary.

I thank God everyday that I didn't let fear rule my life and career. It requires some very hard work, and fear should not be the driving force. Another excellent read Peter... Have a great evening. :)

Peter Haslam said...

Excellent points Sandee

Anonymous said...

Very nice post Peter. I think as we age and gain experience in life, most of us come to the same realization. Fear will always exist, but we all learn to cope with it as times goes by.

Douglas Eason said...

Hi There

I'm going to ramble a little with this please forgive me, but...
What I'm thinking from this is that Fear, too some extent, controls our predictions of the future. And since the future does not equal our past (Thank you Tony Robbins) it means that if we let go of what gave us the fear in the past, we can go some way to letting go of the "what if" factor that determines our future.

Hmmm... :-s

Peter Haslam said...

Yes palm coast and also the realization that most of our fears never come to pass or are far less an impact than we thought

Peter Haslam said...

Well put red nose Fears definitely color our future perspective