The Importance of Self Acceptance

[Tobeapatientlad]

Through most of my life, I've had terrible stage fright. Even a week in advance for a presentation, I'd fear the concept of it worse than death. But it came to a point where I realized that my fear came from my lack of self-confidence. Ever since then, I've made an effort to improve my self esteem and an overall sense of love for myself. In preparation for a recent presentation, I practiced it over and over and over again. Though I realized that preparation is important, I was making it a bit excessive. The more I prepared, the more nervous and neurotic I became about my performance. I just had to stop and realize that my efforts were good enough as they were, and there was no longer a need to practice so much. During my preparations, I found that I wasn't afraid of the people in the audience, but I was afraid of myself. I was afraid of being afraid. A light bulb went off, and a very important component of my self-esteem was revealed. I've spent so much time trying not to be afraid, but I need to accept my own fear. My fear as much as any part of me deserves my affection and attention.

Dear fear, I love you.

[Kobojunkie]

Your fear deserves your affection and attention? How so?

[Tobeapatientlad in reply to Kobojunkie]

I feel like whenever I am presented with a fearful situation, I spend most of my time trying to get rid of the fear. When you tell someone not to think about a stripper dancing to a country song, that's all you think about. The same thing goes for fear. If you try to tell it to go away, it just comes back even stronger. I feel that it is important to embrace your fear because that is when it really goes away. In addition, your fear is a part of yourself. Any aspect of yourself deserves to be loved.

[Kobojunkie in reply to Tobeapatientlad]

what about working towards overcoming that fear so that it is no longer a problem for you cause as long as you have fears, you will have anxiety over it. I don't know if loving your fear instructs Anxiety to quit using your fear against you.

[Hidden]

Hi I think you are very brave being able to speak publicly! My self esteem is ok most of the time but I would be s.....g myself at the thought of this. I would never put myself in a situation where I had to do it.

Well done for overcoming your fear though, I admire you for that.

[Tobeapatientlad in reply to Hidden]

You can too. I fear to present myself publicly all the time. It's just a matter of acknowledging that what you have to offer does matter. But you have to feel that it matters to you first.

[Kobojunkie in reply to Tobeapatientlad]

what you have above sounds more like what one would do to overcome his/her fear though