While Skydiving last weekend I had an amazing epiphany. 

As I was sitting in the plane cruising up to the jump altitude of 13,500 feet, I went into my normal pre-jump routine of practicing my response to a disaster. With my right hand I grabbed the cutaway handle as if cutting away a bad parachute, and then with my left hand grabbed the reserve handle.  I did this several times.

But I noticed, as I was going through the routine sitting there jammed in with other skydivers that I began to feel the rising emotions associated with having a bad parachute. 

In other words I was filling up with fear as I sat there, as if I was actually looking up at a bad chute and having to cutaway, and then pull the reserved handle. I sat in my seat wallowing in the emotion of fear for a moment.  After a few minutes of that I said to myself, cancel, cancel. That’s my cue to replace a negative thought with a positive one. I then imagined myself standing in the open door feeling the cool breeze, letting go for a long freefall, then pulling my main parachute at the correct altitude, and finally looking up at a beautifully opened canopy under the bright blue sky. 

I imagined having a nice three-minute flight back down to the drop zone, and making a perfect landing in the middle of a beautiful green field.  As I closed my eyes and imagined that moment I was immediately overcome by a sense of peace. The fear was overcome by that peace, by simply changing my thought.  What I learned from that was this; fear is simply an assumption.  It’s an assumption that in the future, you’re going to receive more pain than pleasure, more bad than good, or more negative than positive from yourself, your situation, or from someone else. But it’s simply that… an assumption.

So the next time you feel the powerful emotion of fear, realize that it is simply doubt and worry of the future event going unchecked that is causing those feelings and emotions. Ask yourself “what is the worst case scenario”, acknowledge it, and then immediately replace it with a positive thought. When you do that, you will have effectively managed your emotion of fear allowing you to move forward with positive and productive actions and results.

Until next time, I’m Jim Driscoll,
“The man on Fire for Your Success”

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