Your Decision Making Options: Pick Love

Every Hollywood blockbuster deals with this topic, good versus evil, left versus right, hate vs love. But before we differentiate we need to understand something fundamental about ourselves. You are your actions, not your thoughts. Once that is understood you will learn how to differentiate between love based and fear based decision making. You will also be reminded again that you will only change when your actions change.

Transcript

For most of us, Choosing love over fear sounds like just another airy-fairy hocus-pocus yogi mantra used by every other influencer on this planet. But what does it actually mean to make choices in your life based on love and not fear? And why does a choice need to be based on love or fear anyway? Can't a choice be a choice without attachments? Let us have a look at why the sentence choose love over fear is so popular and how this mindset can serve you. So today we are talking about love and fear. Our goal is to make sure that the motivation for taking an action is not manipulated by unnecessary fear. Our goal is to understand that you as a person will not change unless your actions and their origin change. We are also looking at how your personality is defined by your actions and not your thoughts. Abraham Maslow said in any given moment we have two options to step forward into growth or to step back into safety. Let's look at how you can take more steps towards growth. First of all, I want to say that the sentence choose love over fear implies that love is a good thing and fear is a bad thing. I don't want to argue that love is a good thing and fear is generally a bad thing, But fear is also a useful tool to keep you alive and it also often protects you from making bad decisions. So let us define love and fear first. When I'm speaking about love today, I'm speaking about the way that you approach the world. And this means using courage, Kindness, Positivity, Grace, Respect and patience. When you do things with love, You will use these attributes, Especially in your way of dealing with other people. This is the closest definition of the word love in today's context. Next, In order to define fear, Let us distinguish two kinds of fears. Reasonable and unreasonable fear. Unreasonable fear is fear you experience from things that you cannot control or things that might only exist in your head. And unreasonable fear is the fear I'm talking about today. Because this fear holds you back from living the life you are meant to live. Now, Let's look at an example of fear. Let us say you absorb the news for one hour per day. Chances are high that you are creating an unreasonable amount of fear that does not serve you. I'm not saying the news is not true or that you should never watch the news. But what I am saying is that you should be conscious of absorbing news and for that matter anything else that has the potential to plant unreasonable fear in your heart. Now, I also want to make an example of reasonable fear that can serve you. Let us say you enter a bar that you have never been to before. The kind of people in the bar and the state these people are in give you a bit of anxiety in your chest. You decide to react to this feeling of fear and choose to go to another bar. If you're in general not scared to go into bars, Then this most likely has been reasonable fear. Please observe how I did not choose a super obvious example for reasonable fear like running away from a tiger. Reasonable fear can be a lot more subtle and understanding that subconscious reasonable fear exists can serve your life in many ways. You often get a chance to leave situations before they even become dangerous or unhealthy for you. Before we move on, A reminder, When I use the word fear today I'm talking about unreasonable fear. Now, Let us look at why you cannot really choose love over fear. You cannot really choose your emotions. When you get anxious you cannot just say I choose love over fear, Go away fear, One, Two, Three, Gone. If you try that all you do is suppress your fear and it will make your situation even worse and one day you will have a mental breakdown. So now that you understand that you can't really choose emotions, Let's look at the actual choices you can make that will lead you to love-based decision making. So first, Let us look at actions in your life you can choose because your actions influence and define you a lot more than your thoughts. I often say the sentence you are your actions and not your thoughts. So let me explain this a bit more. From an outside standpoint or better yet how other people perceive you, It is your actions that define you. Other people only experience your actions and not at all your thoughts. Even when speaking a word is an action. So the way other people react to you is a hundred percent based on your actions. Now that we understand the power of actions, Try to create them with love as much as possible. Try to create them with courage, Kindness, Positivity, Grace, Respect and patience as much as you can. Next, You're part of a species that is creative and relies on experimentation to find out what is good or bad for us. This means that it's only your actions and not your thoughts that make you grow and develop. Where you go, Who you meet, What you work on, What you eat, What sports you do and so on. All these actions define who you are as a person and as a reaction define how you feel. Your happiness depends on your action. Now the great news for you is that you're in complete control of your actions. They're not involuntarily. You can start and stop any action at any time. You're the master of your life. Try and embrace this power you have over yourself. Now to a lesser degree you can also influence and control your thoughts. You can only do this momentarily because thoughts pop up out of the unconscious without your control. Nevertheless you can consciously change your thoughts and for a short amount of time you can control them. But not for long and definitely not permanently. So become aware of your ability to temporarily change and control your thoughts. It does hold power because in that time you can choose to think with love. Now one thing that you want to become conscious of is that your actions create and define the situation you find yourself in. And the situations you find yourself in subconsciously create your feelings and your thoughts. It is a bit of a chicken or egg game but please understand the power and effect your actions have. Next I would like to talk about understanding underlying motivations. Your motivations for actions often define whether the action is love or fear based. The actual action could even be the same or look very similar. But the motivation is what really makes the difference. Let's look at the example of watching tv. Maybe it's a sunday and you're exhausted and you've been working and socializing all week. You feel like you need to retreat and slow down and you choose to watch a film that serves those needs. Chances are you're making that decision out of love for yourself. Now let's imagine you watch tv five hours a day because you're avoiding something that you're nervous about. You make excuses and allow yourself to become lethargic. Then chances are your action of watching tv is fear-based and does not serve you. Try and tune in more and more to see where your actions come from. What are your motivations? It is worth your time to find it out. Lastly let us look at specific situations and surroundings in your everyday life that can create a feeling of either fear or love. This is important because your state of mind which is influenced by your surroundings will enhance a love or fear-based decision-making modus. So what moments in your everyday life make you less or more content? How do you feel when you listen to the radio? What radio station do you listen to? How do you feel scrolling instagram? Who do you follow on instagram? How do you feel about being at work? How do you feel watching the news? How do you feel talking to a specific friend or your parents or siblings? How do you feel going on your sunday stroll? How do you feel seeing your neighbor's dog? What in your life increases a fear-based attitude and what in your life increases a love-based attitude? Now let's become practical around your fear and love-based decision-making. First of all I would like you to write down 20 actions you can think of from this month. This could be any type of action, Can be social or professional, Can be anything. Maybe you met a friend, Stayed home to watch tv, Did sports, Went to work, Made yourself breakfast, Scrolled through social media, Absorbed this course, Anything. Pause the course now and write down your 20 actions. Now I would like you to write behind every action either the word love or the word fear. Even for the ones that might be a mix or unclear or mundane or unimportant. It doesn't matter. Just choose the one that seems stronger. Pause the course again and come back to it when you've written down love or fear behind every action. During the next few days observe why you make your decisions. Where do they come from? Do they come out of love or fear? This can be hard to analyze quickly but challenge yourself to feel yourself during the next few days.