Christmas Carol Phobia
This week Jennifer Fulwiler on conversationdiary.com admits to her love of Christmas and her phobia of Christmas Carolling.
Jennefier admits how wired her Christmas phobia is, ” Once again, I’m living in fear of Christmas carolers showing up at my door. No, wait, it gets weirder: I love the idea of Christmas caroling. In fact, I submit that the health of a civilization is directly tied to the percentage of its population that goes Christmas caroling…”
Its easy to think that phobics hate their phobia, but similar to Jennifer, a phobic will often like the idea of the thing thy are scared off but their anxiety and fear takes control stopping them enjoying certain aspects of their lives.
There are different ways you can help yourself if you too have a phobia of Christmas Carolling, as Jennifer says in her blog “…on the condition that they gave me a 10-minute warning before they showed up at my house so I could hide in the closet”
This warning would be nice but in reality does not happen, so we need a different approach. For many phobics, they will visualise their phobia which sets the panic off. In Jennifer’s situation she does something different. “I can already hear my mental dialogue if I opened my door to encounter people singing at me. Oh gosh…so I’m just standing here…they’re singing…should I nod my head to the rhythm of the song? I’ll try to sing along…okay, that’s going well…WHAT? Who knew that Jingle Bells had a third verse?!?!?”
Negative self talk has a real impact on your emotions. The voice in your head can create a phobic reaction. I have invented a great technique for reducing anxiety through negative self talk and its only takes 5 minutes to complete:
Step One: replay the negative self talk in you head. On a scale of 1 -10 how far up the scale would you say your fear is?
Step Two: where is the voice in your head; on the right, the left or in the middle?
Step Three: Turn the voice into a shape, if you could turn the voice into a shape, what shape would it be? Give that shape a colour.
Step Four: imagine seeing that shape. Move the shape slowly from your head to your shoulder. how do you feel now? different?
Step Five: move the shape from your shoulder down your arm towards your elbow. On a scale of 1-10 what number would you give the fear now? is it reducing?
Step Six: move the shape all the way down from your elbow to the palm of your hand. Do you feel less anxious now? From your palm let the shape drop onto your leg.
Step Seven: from your leg, let it slide down, towards your knee, past your knee toward your foot. How do you feel now? Nearly gone?
Step Eight: let the shape drop from your foot to the floor, what urge do you have now? what do you want to do to that shape now? do it! now on a scale of 1-10 how does that voice affect you. Most people say by this stage that the voice has gone.
Step Nine: repeat at least three more times or until the voice is gone and powerless. Each time move the shape quicker and quicker until the shape moves from your head to the floor within in the time it takes you to click your fingers.
Read More about Jenniefer Fulwiler takes on Christmas here: 7 Quick Takes about Christmas card love, bizarre caroling phobias, and a reminder that guests are more important than food
Other People Who Read This Article Also Read:
Chris Delaney Specialise in:
FREE Life Coaching Downloads
Sponsored Adverts
Coach Yourself To Success; Reduce Low Self Esteem and Increase Confidence
Train to Be a life Coach and Make Money as a part time or full time Coach
Chris Delaney NLP Life Coach, Hypnotherapist and Career Advisor is available for booking for One to One Private Sessions, Group Training Sessions and Public Speaking Events
Chris Delaney 