Fear not | Look after yourself

If the markers of your personal life, work life, social life – are in the hands of others – you will forever be a slave to someone else’s agenda.

Put simply – if you are a chronic ‘people pleaser’ you’re in for some stress, as the people you try to please move the markers on you. What is your bottom line? What will you do and what will you not do?

You have the right to prioritize what ever you want to prioritize in your life. Why do you need permission to prioritize yourself? Your health. Your family. Set your own agenda for your life and stop apologizing for it.

Work: Beware of the pretend agreement; I work in an industry, rife with pretend agreements. That agreement being, “We both benefit from this relationship”. The real agreement is: “we will both benefit from this relationship, as long as you do what I want”. Add to this dangerous cocktail, our inability to say ‘no’, and our absolute fear of disappointing people (and losing their custom). The amount of stress that this pretend agreement puts on a person, a staff member, a team, should not be accepted. Change the game. Change the agreement, add your own terms, grow some courage to enforce them, and learn that disappointing people is not fatalistic. (Losing a pretend agreement is a good thing). Your relationships will last longer, you’ll save yourself from bitterness and stress, and your pretend ‘relationships’ will turn into mutually beneficial partnerships, where both sides win.

We stress because we fear the potential outcomes of certain situations. The stress is not in the situation itself but in the fear of the situation. Fear is awful stuff. Fear is easily detectable and your fear should never be presented to anyone (lest they take advantage). Fear not. Most things we stress about are not fatalistic. They will not kill you – but the fear of them and the stress that fear causes - will.

Fear not | find some courage and look after yourself

_SKA