Gemma Spake

Don't let, you know, fear convince you that anticipation and excitement are the same as anxiety and that they're a bad thing and that they alone indicate that something is a bad decision.

Your emotions don't know anything more than you do.

They don't know.

They come from you.

They originate from you.

How do they know?

I think the decisions you feel most intensely about just to nail this home, those are the ones, your soul, your heart, whatever it is you think it is, whatever label you give it, there is some deep part of you that is most drawn to them for a reason.

With that being said how do we take the leap?

When do we know that we're ready?

When do we know it's time to jump?

If you've spent most of your life treating change as this big scary dramatic threat you're probably not going to wake up one day and be like cool I suddenly love this I'm ready to go.

A more realistic goal is just to change the story you tell yourself about what change means or about how emotionally ready you are for it.

One theory that can help here that I found is the early 2000s broaden and build theory from somebody called Barbara Fredrickson.

Broaden build is fantastic and it essentially suggests that

counteracting limiting emotions like fear, pessimism, hopelessness with

More positive emotions like curiosity, interest and hope widens our attentional focus and lets us see more possibilities.

When fear and anxiety narrow our focus to the threat or what we have to lose because that is what they're meant to do, curiosity and hope gently just let you see beyond that pinpoint or see beyond the worst case scenario.

Let yourself feel that first wave of like,

this is going to go terrible, what am I doing?

And then send in the second wave, send in the deliberate judgment, one of curiosity and excitement.