Have you noticed that when you are frightened, you make more declarative statements? For example:
I’m lost
I can’t do this
They will never understand me
It’s hopeless
And when you aren’t frightened, you tend to make more explorative statements or ask questions like:
I don’t know where I am right now
I’m not sure how to do this yet
We need to figure out a new approach to this
How can we start looking at this differently?
We can get into a chicken and egg debate about what comes first, the fear or the declarative statement, but regardless of the answer to that, alarm bells should start to go off if you hear yourself making an abundance of declarative statements. It’s time to slow down and give yourself the space to attend to your inner world.
Answer the question: Is something frightening me? If the answer is yes, you can be sure that your fear is coloring how you are perceiving and therefore responding to the situation. The declarative statement is like the canary in the coal mine. Before you start acting on these thoughts, pause, slow down, and introspect. Operating and deciding critical things out of fear is far riskier than slowing down to get more clarity and distance from the problem.
To explorative statements
