I’m ON one lately about microfears.
Is “microfear[s]” — or as i lovingly call them,“MF-ers” — a real word? definitely not. but is it a real thing? definitely yes.⠀These little MFers aren’t the big, huge fears that we love to glorify. Nothing like “I’m afraid of death. I’m afraid of bankruptcy. What if I’m not worthy of love? What if i don’t become successful?”
MFers are those tiny, naggy thoughts that pop up in your head at least a hundred steps BEFORE that big “Oh shit, this is something I need to address” realization happens.
They’re the dull, repetitive thoughts that quietly thump in the back of your mind while you’re off doing other things on autopilot. And it’s easy to keep those thoughts waaaay back there — they’re probably rooted in avoidance, or guilt, or shame, or confusion…and dealing with that definitely doesn’t sound like fun.
“I keep avoiding finishing my reports for work,”
says the marketing assistant who’d rather be outdoors, making art. but her job’s not *that* bad.
“I‘m just not good with, like, feelings,”
says the one who actually has a LOT of feelings. but whatever, they’ll deal with them. later.
“I can’t talk to her after our last fight,”
says the girl who proooobably shouldn’t have gone off at her friend the other night, 3 bottles of wine deep. but whatever, it’s fine.
In the scheme of things, none of these are big problems, right? They’re just little annoyances, and we’ve gotten really good at creating excuses disguised as answers in an effort to make ourselves feel better for a little while. But what about long-term?
“Well, at least I have a job! Could be worse.”
until, 10 years later, you’ve reached peak “success” as CMO and have never been more miserable.
“It’s for the best — I’m too fucked up, I’d probably just disappoint someone anyway. ”
congrats! you actually *have* made a commitment. to deprive yourself of the main thing were created for: human connection.
“She probably doesn’t want to talk to me either. I was such a bitch to her. It’s for the best.”
until 3 months later, you just really miss your friend…and 3 months of #girlsilence seems really, really hard to come back from.
⠀
Listen. Paying attention to these little MFers is actually a good thing.
Once you become more aware of those seemingly innocuous, repetitive, only-slightly-annoying thoughts…you open yourself up to the ability to self-police. You can begin to pay more attention to how often you think something, how actively you’re avoiding something…and if you sit with it for long enough (uncomfortable as it’s gonna be), you can start to work through any of that negative — or hell, even crazy — self talk in super-small doses.
Change at a micro level like that is WAY easier than avoiding something for weeks, months, years.
Nobody wants to wake up 5 years from now, only just realizing the need to unpack a LOT of emotional shit…or worse, wishing they did something differently.
TLDR: those little, annoying thoughts you keep having, and keep ignoring? they’re not little, and they’re not going to go away in 5 years. raise ya damn vibration and deal with it.