RAISED IN CHAOS
At ten years old, I am terrified and alone. I don’t know whom I could trust and seek guidance from for the most difficult conversation I am about to have in my life.
Looking back at this moment, all I can remember is being consumed by fear.
I am sitting in a cold room with my mother, my grandparents, and an attorney. The smell of burnt coffee fills the air and the sound of a rusty furnace hums in the background.
My mother is pale and looks exhausted.
The glow of her face I once remembered and longed for is now gone. I want so badly to know what is going on in her mind, but we’re both too afraid to look into each other’s eyes.
I look to my grandparents to see their eyes carrying excruciating pain and sadness. I imagine their cascading thoughts as they reflect on how our family arrived in this room.
Are they filled with regret?
Are they relieved?
The truth is, I’ll never really know.
The attorney turns to me and says in a monotone voice, “Peter, what is it you would like to tell your mother in this moment?”
The lump in my throat grows with each passing second and I’m finding it hard to breath.
My grandmother squeezes my hand in an effort to provide security and strength amidst the confusion and pain that encapsulates me.
My eyes begin to fill with tears.
As I bite my tongue to keep from breaking down, I take one more deep breath, turn toward my mother, and say:
Mom, I’ve decided to go live with Grandma and Grandpa since I no longer feel safe with you because of your alcoholism.
Your alcoholism has consumed your life and I no longer feel loved by you.
The only way my sister and I will feel comfortable living with you again is for you to go through rehab and choose, once and for all, to give up the bottle for your kids.
It’s your choice, Mom. If you want to be a part of our lives, you’re going to have to give up drinking.
My mother runs across the room to embrace me one last time and we both break down weeping. This would be my mother’s fourth time through rehab, and at this point in my life, I am doubtful that she will choose me and my sister over the bottle.
If there were one predominant emotion I remember from my childhood, it would have to be fear.
At ten years old, I didn’t fully understand the impact that event in the courtroom would have on my life. But over the coming years I noticed, as I moved from place to place, that I had started to build these people-pleasing tendencies.
Fearing that I was somehow deficient or not enough, I was driven to seek approval and validation from those around me. And as time went on, my fear and inner people-pleaser led to a life of inauthenticity.
FAST-FORWARD TO A DAY THAT CHANGED MY LIFE FOREVER…
I received a call from a family member: “Peter, your dad has been rushed to the hospital, and you need to fly home immediately if you want to say good-bye.”
My dad had literally given up on life and chose to drink himself to death.
I remember walking into the hospice and seeing my dad, a man who had once been my childhood hero, lying there emaciated in bed.
I held his hand and asked, “Dad, why did you do this to yourself? Why did you do this to me?” He looked into my eyes and said, “Son, because I’m afraid.”
My dad loved me so much, but he was consumed by the fear of not being good enough and of not living up to the expectations of his parents.
My father died at sixty years old because of his fears … I was twenty-five.
Shortly after my father passed, I became introspective about the impact fear had on my life. I noticed that fear kept me from living the life I desired. And I became highly committed to uncovering and overcoming these fears by doing that which I feared.
HOW MANY TIMES DO YOU FIND YOURSELF FROZEN BY FEAR?
Your heart races, your breathing becomes shallow and fast. And soon you are paralyzed by trepidation.
Fear takes many forms, many of which I have personally experienced and overcome. I feared looking back on my life and discovering wasted opportunities or unrealized potential. I feared disappointing my family and losing their approval. I feared the unknown when starting out toward a new destination in my business.
Maybe you are a perfectionist and battle the fear of failure. Or you are afraid of losing your time freedom and sabotage yourself from reaching that next level of success in your business.
Whatever brand of fear you are experiencing, the emotion can be debilitating.
No matter how overwhelmed and paralyzed your fears are making you feel, you can break through to fearlessness.
WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO BE FEARLESS?
Being fearless is not the absence of fear. Being fearless is having the courage to act, in spite of your fears.
If you create the habit of advancing toward your fears instead of retreating from them, your fear will dissipate.
Most of the power of fear is in your mind. What you fear doesn’t really exist. It’s just an idea that looms because you are unwilling to face it.
So the best way to defuse your fear is to step into it, right in the middle of it. And do the thing you are afraid to do. @PeterScottIV (Click to Tweet!)
So be courageous today! Look the fear in the eye and shoot it down. Don’t let it take you over. Don’t let it win.
Creating a fearless mindset doesn’t mean all your fears will disappear.
Creating a fearless mindset means that you will boldly move in the direction of your fears and create the life you’ve only dared to imagine.
Peter Scott IV is the Founder of the Fearless Life Academy and Author of the #1 bestselling book, “The Fearless Mindset.” Peter has dedicated his life to mentoring high performing entrepreneurs to conquer their fears and create the life they’ve only dared to imagine. You can connect with him on Facebook, Twitter and his website.
