Fear

Fear is an emotion that everybody has at some time or another. Sometimes you can feel fear when you think you are in danger. For example, if you are afraid of dogs and you see a dog coming towards you, you can feel the fear in your body.

Sometimes you can be so fearful that you cannot move, you might scream or try to hide. If you have a really big fear about something there is usually a reason for it. Maybe someone told you that a dog would bite you or maybe a dog did bite you in the past.

You don’t want not to feel fear, because fear can stop you doing something that might cause you to hurt yourself. For example, you are out cycling and notice the traffic lights are not working at a busy roundabout. This makes you fearful of cycling through the roundabout so you decide to get off your bike and walk on the footpath instead. Fear in this situation made you act in a way that kept you safe.

It is good to have a healthy fear of dogs, not all dogs are friendly nor do all dogs want to be rubbed. Just like humans dogs have different personalities, some are just friendlier than others and you need to be careful. This is how you use fear in a good way. You feel it and decide to not go over to a dog and pet it.

What you don’t want to do is feel fear and be so fearful that you don’t deal with it. You want to feel fear and figure out what to do with it. Maybe you already know that when you become fearful your hands start to sweat or your heart starts to beat faster.

You can learn how to do something called tapping which will help you to tune into the fear you feel in your body and better understand it.  

Take a look at the picture of the teddy and the picture of the alien. See which one you prefer. They are showing you where you can tap.

You can go here and see Conal using tapping to get rid of his fear of getting sick in the car!!! You can always change the words and say something like this.

Even though I am very frightened I am a great kid.

Even though I don’t really know why I am so frightened I am a great kid.

Even though I know that the spider/dog will not do anything wrong to me, I accept myself the way I am and I am a great kid.

Even though this fear is huge and I don’t know what to do with it, I am a great kid.

Happy tapping