Fear

As a gymnastics coach, I deal with fear on an everyday basis. I watch gymnasts battle with it, be overwhelmed by it, and try to overcome it. I have gone to seminars about it, studied techniques to get over it, and even come up with a few of my own. 

​One of those is an acronym called BRAVE: breathe, reaffirm, act, visualize, engage. Step one, take a breath. Two: reaffirm who you are and what you’re capable of. “Act” confident, like you got this. Visualize success. And then Engage—stop hesitating and go!

​ Sometimes these steps work and sometimes they don’t. And I know that firsthand. 

​As a child, I remember fear being ever present. My three older brothers were full of shenanigans like dragging me out into the ocean where I couldn’t stand, forcing me on rides I was too scared to get on, and leaning me over their shoulders off a bridge or over a scenic outlook. As a gymnast, I remember being forced to do my beam tumble even though my basics were inept and physically and mentally I was not ready. And as a 4th and 5thgrader, after my brother moved on to middle school, I had to walk to school alone—a fifteen minute walk that passed by houses with big dogs and a busy road I had to cross over, each time sprinting to the other side thankful I hadn’t been run over. Later, in middle school, I stood at my bus stop at the top of my street by myself, still in the darkness of night, praying some van didn’t drive by and snatch me up. Every day began with a feeling of dread and the consistent, constant presence of fear. 

​When I look back on it, I wonder why I didn’t tell my parents I was scared? I don’t think the thought ever occurred to me that I could ask for help. In a family built on bravery and toughness, fear wasn’t something we discussed. Was I even allowed to be scared? I guess I didn’t think so. 

​Family legend had it that the day I was brought home from the hospital my two-year-old brother threw my out of my crib. I was later found on the floor, whimpering but not crying. It became a funny story, one we all laughed about. You were so tough, so quiet, so unbreakable. This is what I heard and so, thisis who I became.

​One of the biggest barriers to brave is not getting the help we need. It takes another kind of bravery to be able to name the fear and then get the support and advice we need to move past it.As a shy and introverted child, I did not possess it. 

Now, as a coach, I see this so often, kids afraid to speak up, to admit that they are scared. I have to remind them that there is no shame in scared—only steps. Sometimes a step forward and sometimes back to find your footing and confidence once again.Without a relationship of trust, they will often hold their silence inside where they feel trapped and alone, as I did.

​I learned another acronym about fear once. FEAR. False Evidence Appearing Real. And while I can find some validity in that—some fears are more irrational than others, it takes awaythe possibility that sometimes our fears ARE real and most times, there is an element of danger involved. Is my fear of elevators irrational? Maybe. But people have been trapped in them for hours. Was my fear of rides irrational? Maybe. But at the Big Butler Fair, I almost fell off of one, being too small. And at Water Country in Florida when I was six, I popped off my innertube in the lazy river and became trapped under water, pinned below a sea of other innertubes. Before my dad fished me out, I almost drowned. 

Telling people they are being irrational instead of validating that real sense of danger is one of the worst, most insensitive things we can do. We must instead think, how can I help alleviate the danger? How can support someone having such a strong and visceral emotion. Does this make me a “softy” as a coach? Lol. You can ask my gymnasts about that! Being empathetic and understanding doesn’t mean I’m not tough. 

​Many times I offer spotting, mats, or low beams to work though fear just so a gymnast can take active steps to start erasing fear. If they need help, all they have to do is ask…which some gymnasts hate even more than doing the skill itself. But asking and asserting yourself is a step, and any step, no matter how small is helpful because fear can be paralyzing. 

When we are experiencing fear, we are rarely thinking about technique or logic. We are only thinking about how we can survive. Only when we get out of that fight or flightresponse with a pounding heart and shaky hands, can we effectively enact the steps of BRAVE and apply them. 

But overcoming fear has to be a choice, not a requirement. Every human should have the free-will to look at the things that scare them and then decide if they are willing to overcome the dangers, either real or imagined. When I look back, I can see those choices were stolen from me. I was forced onto the high beam, forced into the ocean, forced to walk alone. I hope I can say this loud enough for those in the back: being forced into scary situations is NOT what has made me brave! Those are the things that have made me scared, worried and doubtful, in myself but also in others.

​What has made me seek bravery are those times I willingly made a choice. The times I took one small step forward toward something that felt scary. I began to learn from those experiences. I began to grow from them. On my own terms, I saw many of those fears were not going to kill me—like asking a question in a crowded room, or reading a poem at an open mic. I felt scared, but afterward, I felt proud and empowered and I wanted to seek out that feeling again…and again. I traveled to Costa Rica, Iceland, Switzerland, each time learning more about myself, how to travel, and what I was capable of. 

I teach my gymnasts and call upon other writers to put themselves out there. But only they can make that choice, when they feel ready. All you can do is encourage them, to walk next to them in solidarity, to let them know their fear is real and it is allowed, and it is okay. But that also, that fear may not be bigger than you. You can take a hose to that fire and quelch the shit out of. Then you can take those ashes and build something beautifulwith them. It might look like you landing your first backhandspring or catching your first geinger. It might feel like you leaning in for a first kiss, or jumping out of a plane. It might sound like call of a blue-jay deep in the woods, a rustle of the leaves on the Appalachian trail—or it might just sound like your own voice, declaring I’m scared but I’m going to breathe, to trust, to leap. I’m scared but I’m going to do it anyway. For me.