Module 5: Callings & Fear Key Concepts Part 1 Fear: Learning Objectives 1. Facilitators Training participants develop the ability to recognize pachad and yirah in themselves. 2. FT participants develop a fear toolkit they can use to shift out of pachad and become able to savor and welcome yirah. 3. FT participants are able to introduce clients to concepts of pachad and yirah. 4. FT participants are able to recognize pachad in clients, and provide tools to help clients shift out of pachad. 5. FT participants are able to recognize, discuss and effectively address the common ways fears may be misleading their clients (generalizing from specific fear to associated circumstances, over-reactive/over-protective fear, etc.). 6. FT participants are able to recognize yirah in clients, and guide clients in embracing yirah, rather than moving away from it. Key Concepts for Understanding Fear Pachad and yirah are two Old Testament terms, ancient Hebrew words for two different kinds of fear. Pachad is the fear of projected or imagined things. This is our over-reactive, irrational, lizard-brain fear, that is attempting to protect us from any potential or WWW.TARAMOHR.COM PAGE 1
perceived danger. It tends to be focused on possible future outcomes or consequences. Pachad often arises when clients take, or contemplate taking playing bigger steps, that expose them to any kind of emotional danger: criticism, push back, leaving the herd, failure, the unfamiliar or unknown. To play bigger, they need a way of moving past pachad. There are lots of simple ways we can shift out of fear. Here are 15 of them: 1. Tap into your inner mentor. 2. Invite love in. 3. Get curious. 4. Shift into another positive state. 5. Reconnect to your desire to serve. 6. Talk with your younger self. 7. Label it. 8. Analyze truth, possibility, probability. 9. Come back to the present moment. 10. Follow the fear to the endgame. 11. Breathe. 12. Do a physical relaxation. 13. Visualize or look at calming imagery. 14. Use music. 15. Move through it. WWW.TARAMOHR.COM PAGE 2
Yirah has three definitions: o The feeling that overcomes us when we suddenly come into possession of more energy than we are used to having. o The feeling we feel when we inhabit a larger space than we are used to. o The feeling we feel in the presence of the divine. Yirah is a kind of fear, but it has a quality of awe and reverence to it. We often feel it when we are pursuing a calling, expressing ourselves creatively, or speaking our truths. Yirah is uncomfortable, and can be easily mistaken for regular old fear, causing us to want to avoid it. But it s actually a sacred feeling we can welcome, savor and breathe into, knowing it means we are taking an important playing bigger step. Working with Clients We can expect clients to feel fear both pachad and yirah at many points along the journey to playing bigger. Some ways to tell yirah and pachad apart in your clients: o We usually feel yirah about what we are saying or doing in that moment. We usually feel pachad because we are imagining a particular future outcome. o Yirah has a tinge of thrill to it, and a sense of openness that pachad does not. For many people, pachad comes with a physically tight or constricted feeling. WWW.TARAMOHR.COM PAGE 3
o We tend to feel pachad when the ego feels threatened in some way. We tend to feel yirah when we are doing something that causes us to transcend the ego. When you notice a client s pachad (fear of possible negative future outcomes that may come with playing bigger), particularly over-reactive and overprotective fears, use one or more of the tools for pachad to help the client shift out of fear. Practice using many of the 15 tools (above) so that you can develop your own toolkit of different ways to help clients shift out of fear. When you notice a client s yirah, either as she declares a truth in a session with you, or recounts an important playing bigger experience, your role is to help her honor that experience, notice the yirah that came with it, and simply savor it. She may be tempted to rush past it or avoid the experience in the future, because yirah is a heightened, uncomfortable state of being. Part 2 Callings: Learning Objectives 7. Facilitators Training participants identify their own current callings, increase awareness about their habitual or default responses to their callings, and begin to relate to them with more respect and openness. 8. FT participants learn the common qualities of a calling and the common objections and resistance individuals often feel toward their callings. 9. FT participants are able to help clients identify their callings based on the common qualities of a calling. 10. FT participants are able to help clients move past objections or resistance. WWW.TARAMOHR.COM PAGE 4
11. FT participants are able to help clients discover possible courses of action to take around their callings, with a particular emphasis on enabling the client to live out their calling today. Key Concepts for Understanding Callings Callings are the assignments individuals receive to bring light into the world in a particular way. We all receive multiple callings over a lifetime, and often, multiple callings at once. The old question is, What s my calling? The new question is What callings am I receiving right now? The goal is not to discover the one right calling, but rather, to become more attuned to, respectful of, and able to take action around our callings. Callings may happen in the domain of our professional, personal, creative, or communal lives. They may last a long time (like a decades-long career) or be very short (like a particular gesture or project.) The following common qualities can help us identify a calling: o You feel an unusually vivid pain or frustration around the status quo of a particular issue or topic. o You see a powerful vision vague or clear about what could be. o You feel huge resistance. o You feel a sense of this work is mine to do or of having received an assignment. o Doing the work feels special. You feel a rare sense of meaning, rightness, and immense energy when doing the calling. WWW.TARAMOHR.COM PAGE 5
o You don t yet have everything you need to have to complete the task. o You aren t yet the person you need to be to do the calling. o The journey is the reward. Our common objections to our callings include: I m too old, I m too young, I m not an expert, I don t know enough, I don t have the right experience, It s too big, It s unrealistic, It s too small (or shallow or frivolous). Surprisingly, the fulfillment comes not when we reach the goal or the end state of the calling, but when we give ourselves full permission to feel and go for the calling. The joy and vitality comes not when we reach the destination, but when we fully step on the road. Often we get confused and do the project around a calling but stop doing the work that is at the essence of the calling (for example, Carol ends up neglecting her calling to create beautiful flower arrangements because she is so busy growing the staff for our flower arranging business). It s key to use the 1000-year test to identify the essence of the calling and make sure any plans/projects allow the individual to live that calling not the project that may surround it! Working with Clients In working with clients around their callings, your roles may include any of the following: Help the client to identify current callings, using the list of common qualities. Help the client to move past I don t know to draw out and validate the aspects of a calling that they do know about. (Often women know more than we think we do about our callings! The issue is not so much I don t know most of WWW.TARAMOHR.COM PAGE 6
the time, but that we are pushing aside, denying, or rationalizing away some of what we feel/know/envision.) Use questions like, What part do you know? Or, Are there any ideas or visions that show up from time to time? Or, Are there any particular directions you feel pulled in? Or, Are there any ideas that you ve pushed aside or decided couldn t work, or couldn t be your calling? Guide the client to move past issues of not being expert enough, (a very common barrier). The key tool here is to use the framework of the four ways we can contribute value around any topic: as survivors, experts, cross-trainers, or as simply called. You can help your clients understand and honor whichever role or roles they are playing in relation to their callings. Guide the client to move past practical objections to a calling (time constraints, family responsibilities, financial responsibilities, training required, etc.) by using the 1000-year test, 1) helping clients identify the essence of the calling and then 2) brainstorming ways to live that calling today. Enable the client to become more aware of any of their unhelpful ways of responding to callings (ignoring, arguing with, playing the skeptic, repressing, postponing) and to cultivate a more loving relationship. Thinking of metaphors of courting a calling or nurturing a plant can help the client feel into new possibilities here. WWW.TARAMOHR.COM PAGE 7