A New Story About Fear

Posted on May 08, 2025 by Maria T. Resele, One of Thousands of ADD ADHD Coaches on Noomii.

Once upon a breath, you felt it again; that familiar tightening in your chest, the whisper in your stomach, the invisible wave rushing in before your thoughts could catch it.

“Fear”. Not the kind that roars, but the kind that lingers quietly behind the scenes. The “what if” kind. The kind that plays out stories (initiates dramas) in the theatre of your mind before life even writes the script.

If this sounds familiar, it’s not a flaw in you. It’s a pattern, and just like all patterns. It was learned. Which means, beautifully and it can be rewired.

You see, the subconscious mind doesn’t process negative statements. It learns through experience, emotion, repetition, and images. What you picture, your nervous system feels. What you feel, your body believes. What you believe becomes your world, and you perceive it as reality.

So let’s step inside a new story, one where fear isn’t the villain, but the misunderstood guide.

1: The Worry Loop

A Misguided GPS
Imagine your mind as a GPS with outdated software. It’s been programmed to reroute you around pain, to over-prepare, overthink, and overanalyze every possible route… “just in case.” Worry, then, is not logical. Its imagination has gone rogue. It’s an internal movie of future disasters that haven’t happened. The body, unable to tell the difference between the imagined and the real, floods with adrenaline. The GPS keeps shouting: “Recalculating! Danger ahead!” But what if, instead of chasing these phantom exits, you paused? You interrupted the loop.

In NLP, this is called a pattern interrupt. A simple shift that says: “Stop the film. Let’s ask a better question.” Is this fear happening now, or am I time-traveling in my mind?

Now breathe gently. Curiously ask: What would trust feel like in my body right now?
Maybe it’s warmth in your chest. Or a breath that reaches your belly. Maybe it’s the quiet strength of just being here, now.

Every time you do this, allow yourself to feel it instead of fighting it. In this way you rewire the GPS. You teach your body: not all alerts mean danger. Some mean to look inward.

2: The Power of Embodied Prayer

The Nervous System Meets the Divine
Now, I invite you to practice this;
Place your hand on your heart and the other on your belly.
Breathe slowly, like you’re listening to life itself.
This isn’t just calming; it’s neurobiological co-regulation that helps to attune the ventral vagal pathway (Vagus nerves), that ancient bridge between brain and body.

Breathing begins. Humming starts. Your system softens, and then, a whisper rises not from your thoughts, but from your inner being.

“Let the breath be a prayer, and the prayer be a breath.”

At this moment, prayer becomes a somatic language. A conversation between the Divine and your body. It’s not about fixing the fear. It’s about feeling that fear held within it.
This is not striving. It’s surrender. It’s not pushing. It’s presence.

3: Gratitude

The Body’s Way of Remembering Safety
When fear shrinks your world. Gratitude expands it. When you name what’s working, what’s beautiful, what’s already here, you shift your inner chemistry. Your prefrontal cortex lights up. Your amygdala, that inner alarm bell, dims down. You move from hypervigilance to clarity.

Here’s a simple neuro-anchor you can try:

Name 3 things you’re truly grateful for.
As you speak to them, press your thumb and forefinger together.
Let a soft smile rise, and feel it travel through your chest and belly.
This exercise help your body programs to remember this state.
When practiced, it becomes your new baseline. Your new emotional home.
Because gratitude isn’t a thought. It’s a felt truth that tells the brain: “I am safe now.”

Where Does Fear Come From?
Beneath most anxiety is a subconscious protection strategy.
A child inside you who learned from early experience:
• If I’m perfect, I’ll be loved.
• If I overthink, I’ll stay safe.
• If I disappear, I won’t get hurt.
These are not weaknesses. They’re early adaptations. They helped you survive.
But now? You’re allowed to choose differently.
“What helped me survive back then is not what helps me thrive now.”

New Choices that crate a New Pathways
If you always say yes, try a gentle no.
If you over-prepare, leave space for grace.
If you chase perfection, whisper: “Good enough is safe enough.”
Each opposite action is a neural rehearsal for freedom.
It tells your body: “We don’t live in the past anymore.”

Somatic Check-In
Simple somatic practice to code a new experience of calm:
✅ Orienting – Turn your head. Name 5 things you see.
✅ Grounding – Press your feet into the floor. Feel gravity hold you.
✅ Soothing touch – One hand on heart, one on belly. Breathe.
✅ Vocalize – Hum or sigh. Let the vagus nerves sing.
✅ Pendulate – Shift awareness between tension and calm. Track contrast.
Let your physique track safety. Let your mind follow the body’s lead.

The Truth About Healing
Fear isn’t asking you to be fearless. It’s asking you to listen, to pause, and to recode your inner map. And you are not broken. You are becoming.

Philippians 4:6 reminds us: “Don’t worry about anything, but pray and ask God for everything you need, always giving thanks for what you have.”

That’s not just scripture. It’s a somatic sequence:
→ Interrupt the worry loop.
→ Regulate through embodied prayer.
→ Anchor in gratitude.

From fear to faith.
From reaction to response. From coping to co-creation.

Journal your experience with curiosity
What fear still protects you from?
What new story is your body ready to believe?
Let fear be a teacher, not a trap.
Let trust be a muscle that grow with practice.

You’ve already started and that’s enough.

Maria T. Resele MSc
Integrative Somatic Therapist & Coach

References for Citation
Levine, Peter A. (2010). In an Unspoken Voice: How the Body Releases Trauma and Restores Goodness. North Atlantic Books.
Supports: Somatic experiencing, pendulation, nervous system healing.
Porges, Stephen W. (2011). The Polyvagal Theory: Neurophysiological Foundations of Emotions, Attachment, Communication, and Self-Regulation. W.W. Norton & Company.
Supports: Vagus nerve, co-regulation, neurobiological safety.
Fisher, Janina. (2021). Transforming the Living Legacy of Trauma: A Workbook for Survivors and Therapists. PESI Publishing.
Supports: Trauma responses as adaptations, rewiring patterns, inner child work.
Dispenza, Joe. (2014). You Are the Placebo: Making Your Mind Matter. Hay House.
Supports: Neuroplasticity, belief affecting biology, subconscious programming.
Schwartz, Richard C., & Sweezy, Martha. (2021). Internal Family Systems Therapy (2nd ed.). Guilford Press.
Supports: Subconscious parts, protective strategies, healing through curiosity.
The Holy Bible, New International Version. Philippians 4:6
Scripture quote: “Don’t worry about anything, but pray and ask God for everything you need…”