A few weeks ago, we were delivering a Fear Workshop. It was a hands-on workshop allowing the participants plenty of opportunities to get up close and personal with their fears. As always, the topic of where is your focus came up time and time again.

In the Fear Workshop the participants got the opportunity to learn more about snakes and spiders. They also got to handle the snakes and spiders. It’s a great workshop for getting people out of their comfort zones. Obviously, not everyone is afraid of snakes or spiders and some people love the opportunity to handle “creepy crawlies”. For others, well, let’s just say it can be a very tough and powerful experience.

Now, before I go any further, I must assure you that we partner with a very professional company called Talking Reptiles and they specialise in working with snakes and spiders. They are fully insured and 100% committed to the well being of their little friends. They also have a great appreciation for the work we do, and they love being involved in this workshop.

Where is your focus and fears…?

So, as I said, not everyone is afraid of snakes and spiders which is why we work with lots of different activities in our Fear Workshops. For now, though, I am going to focus on our reptile friends.

What becomes very apparent for people when they are facing their fears is that they become incredibly focused on those fears. Their minds race through all the things that they hate, fear and dislike about the snakes or spiders. And when I say race through, I mean race through at high speeds and in a repetitive loop.

Take a moment and think about a time when you were facing something that terrified you. Can you remember your thoughts and how fast they came at you? Can you remember any rational thoughts among them? Where was your focus? For most of us, we are usually focused on what we are afraid of or dreading and we find it very difficult to get away from that.

This always get me thinking about where we let our focus go. Do we look for the bad or the good?

Where is your focus in a Traffic Jam?

Consider this. If you drive a lot, you are bound to end up in traffic jams and it is easy to become focused on those. I am not referring to daily rush hour traffic, there is very little change with that; this is referring to day to day driving.

I know for me, there are certain towns that I drive through and when I get caught in traffic, I can hear my mind going on and on about how the traffic is bad there. But when I think about it (and I have), I realise that most of the time, the traffic is fine as I drive through that town. In fact, there are loads of times that I drive through and have no traffic problems at all. So, where is my focus?

Now as I drive though towns that have traffic problems I acknowledge the days that are easy driving. It really helps me change my focus. Try it and let me know what you think.

Where is your focus and the weather?

I live in Ireland. It rains a lot. In return, we get to live in one of the greenest countries in the world. Yet, it is very common for people in Ireland to complain about the weather. We even complain if it is too hot, but that’s another story.

The rain does get to people though and hearing people say they wish it would stop raining is very common. Yet, when I put this in context, we have delivered over 200 Firewalks in Ireland in the last few years and only twice was it raining when we were Firewalking. How is that so?

Or going back to my time as a Coasteering Guide, we rarely had rain when we were out with groups. Of course, I don’t have stats to back this up but when it comes to the Firewalks, the two times that it rained while Firewalking are very vivid in my mind.

So, when it comes to the weather, where is your focus?

These are just a couple of easy examples that can get you to think about where your focus is at. The key thing to do now is pay attention to your thoughts. Watch them closely. Observe them and see where they focus and if that is what you want to focus on.This a great learning and something you can practice when Firewalking, Glass Walking or training as a Firewalk Instructor.