Leaning Into Fear: A New Relationship With the Voice That Stops You

In this episode, we explore the invisible force that often shapes our choices without us realizing: fear. Not the kind that keeps you safe, but the kind that quietly convinces you to shrink — to stay small, delay action, or play it safe. What if fear isn’t the enemy, but your relationship to it is?

We’ll uncover how fear shows up in our lives, not as a signal to stop, but as a signpost pointing to growth. You'll hear reflections that invite you to question: Where have you bumped up against fear and stopped short? What belief did you form about yourself in that moment? And more importantly, what new possibilities could open up if you chose a different meaning?

If fear wasn’t in the way, what would you do? Who would you become?

Let this episode guide you to challenge the story you've been telling yourself. You’ll leave with clarity, questions to sit with, and a renewed sense of what’s truly possible when you stop seeing fear as a wall — and start seeing it as a door.

To subscribe, comment or ask a question, visit www.donnyraus.com.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Most people spend their entire lives dressed without ever giving a single thought as to what it is they really want and what's important. I used to live the way the comfort job and I hate it. As a result, I have my own coffee company. I'm just coming somebody. I like that you live, but it starts with your host coming around. One line. Said differently, leaning into uh discomfort. Let me ask you a question. Have you ever felt a time where uh you wanted, you were going to do an action, you were going to meet a group of people or try to book a trip, whatever it may be, and then all of a sudden in that moment uh or in the process, you feel this immediate, like uh overwhelming sense of resistance to it. What happened after that? Did you push food through to the other side, or did you recoil and come backward? See, the quality of your life as well as your your happiness really depends on what you do in instances like that. We have two choices. We could either expand or we could contract. Most people, uh in you know, yours including, uh we tend to expand when we experience extreme pains. It's one of the things that keeps people moving forward, right? There's two things that motivate you pain and pleasure. Pain is painful. Pleasure when you um when you are going by letting pleasure guide you, the it changes the entire experience. But what if the using pain didn't have to be painful? What if you could let go of that resistance that you feel and and take the action without any kind of um uh without the outcome, like without saying this has to happen. What kind of doors would that open up for your life, for your career, for your relationships? The story that I'm gonna share with you now is about leaning into fear, or said differently, what I like to call resting into fear. When you think about the term that I'm just using, resting into fear. What do you what can you imagine when you hear the words resting into fear? When the image that conjures up in my mind is literally like leaning against the wall of fear, and all of a sudden kind of melting into it, or you can even say melting into fear, whatever works for you. But I want to talk about leaning into fear, and I'm gonna use uh an experience from my past trip to demonstrate this. So, in my most recent trip, I was traveling around Europe. Um mainly it happened in um Austria, uh, Slovakia, and then when I went to oh, it was only those two countries. I hit a turned a new leaf when I got into Hungary. But I was in those countries, and my immediate uh like my first response was that it was the culture felt very cold. Northern Italy, Austria, not the warmest cultures when we were just talking about the the day-to-day culture. And as a result of this, I started going very inward, like, oh my god, is it me? What's going on? And then there was a time I was in um I was in Bratislava, it was in Hungary as well. I was in Bratislava, and I remember I was just walking around the old center. Some tourists were gathered. There weren't a whole lot of tourists, relatively speaking to uh the other places that I was visiting, but there was a guy who was holding a sign in the center of the square and saying, you know, free walking tour, and uh, you know, holding the sign there is it meeting in five minutes, whatever. I just happened to be in the uh the center square, and I was watching that. I was like, oh, maybe I'll do it. You know, I didn't know what else to do there. I was at the time, I was um I had stayed one night in Bratislava, and the second night I had to find a new hostel because I accidentally booked a female dorm something that's been happening over and over in the last few trips, and it's not because I'm doing it intentionally, it's because when sometimes um when I'm booking my trips, I am usually booking these my accommodations and my flights or bus or train the night of. So sometimes I'm just like so tired and I've been looking at a screen for so long that I can't even comprehend. Like I don't even know what I'm looking at, and I just want to get the process done. So I just literally click anything and then I press send. I'm like, all right, it's perk. Just I can relax. I can relax until I get to the place so that I booked the accommodations, only realize that I booked it wrong. But I was in Bratislava and I had a change that that morning I had to change hostels, and I decided to go stroll around. I went to the castle and I kind of did this loop around the entire, uh, the entire old city. And then I was like, all right, now what do I do? So I was walking in the old square, and then I saw the guy doing the walking tour, and I was like, you know what? Maybe I'll maybe I'll just learn something about their history. Let me maybe I'll just join. Let me see who comes. So people started to gather in the square, uh, you know, a bigger and bigger crowd. And I was like, I and I walked up to where um they were gathering. And in my mind, I was like, oh, should I should I stay here? Should I leave? Oh, this is am I gonna waste my time? What was going on in that moment, really? Was I afraid of wasting time? No, I had nowhere to be. I had nothing to do, right? I wasn't wasting time. I'd already went around the city and I was like, what do I do? So there was no the the the fear wasn't about wasting time. The fear I was experiencing or the apprehensiveness there was just because what if you know I meet people and they're not accepting, right? These are the things that are subconsciously going on in my mind. But I was trying to like, I was trying to, or feeling awkward in my mind, my mind was trying to mask it as one thing. Oh, don't want to waste time, but in all actuality, I'm smarter, you know, I'm smart enough to know what's really going on because I question, or what is it that I'm really afraid of? But using uh using previous experiences as a guide, I decided that I was gonna attend the uh I was gonna uh do the tour. So in the the tour starts, and you know, the guy is using he's he was very good as a tour operator because of the uh the different cues and tactics he was using. One to make sure, well they operate on tip, but he did a very good job at making sure, one that you were very much aware of that, and two, uh making sure that you stuck around. So he would hold a um he had like a restaurant guide and cafes and stuff that he had printed out. And the only way you can collect this was if you stayed to the end. Very, very intelligent. And there were some other things as well that he had used, but I know I remember in the moment I was like, wow, this guy, this guy's a good tour operator. Um, anyways, during that tour, um there was a good group of people, and nobody was saying a thing, nobody was even speaking to one another. And I was walking, and then um this German guy started a conversation with me and broke the ice, and all of a sudden, a group of us, me, him, and uh a guy, Jacob from Poland, all started like uh talking with one another. And um from that point the it changed the entire tour as well as the experience of of that evening. And as we were walking, I mean this German guy, remember, he was very he was very interesting because he lived uh at the time he was living in Greece, but he was also living, he lived in South America, and he he gets to travel all around for his uh for his work, and I thought it was fascinating. Um, but the point I'm trying to make was that had I not leaned into that fear, had I not recognized what exactly it was that I was afraid into and just went with it, I would never have met these two guys that I later um I later ended up going out and grabbing food with. And that seemed to be the theme of the experience when I went to Hungary. The same thing happened. In Hungary, I um I think it happened in Austria too, although um I did meet a few guys in Austria, same exact thing. I don't know why I chose to do Slovakia, um, but as a as the story, but the same thing happened in Austria, in Vienna, and the same thing happened in Hungary as well. I was at the hostel, they were doing a tour. It would this tour was uh to to photograph the cherry blossoms. And as a result of going that tour, all of a sudden I started meeting all these new people, but in my mind, I'm like, this is a waste of time. Why am I gonna go do this thing? This is stupid, right? But and I did it. I ended up going out there, having a blast, and meeting a bunch of people that I would meet up with the night after or the day after. And the point I'm trying to make in this is that you could, you know, recognize the fear and just lean into it. And then all of a sudden you'll have a different experience that will give you a new, uh, a new reference in terms of when other things like that happen. You're like, you know what, let me just go with the flow, let me just lean into it and see what happens. Because from the past experience, it's only been positive. So, fast forward now, I'm back here in the States, and my brother had connected me with uh this person to meet with uh in the coffee business. This person is uber successful in in terms of how he's grown his business. And I'm like, oh my gosh, like how do I go meet this guy that I've never met? I'm surprised he even agreed to meet with me because he doesn't even really know my brother, and this guy's time is valuable. And I'm going on and on, and then I was like getting nervous about the the entire interaction. But then I remembered that experience that I had in Hungary and Slovakia and in Vienna. And I said, you know, let me just what what is what do I think is gonna happen? Let me just lean into it and see what happens, right? Because there's leaning into it, resting against the fear, the wall of fear. The reason why I'd like to use the uh the word resting into the into fear is because when you think about rest gone, right? Imagine like you're resting against a wall, and what resting implies that you're you're you're slowing down, you're you're relaxed, you're feeling peaceful. And what happens when you're when you're feeling that way, right? Your your body just kind of turns to jello, and it's almost like you become one with the wall. You like melt into the wall. The same thing is true of your fears. So when you're when you're there and you're recognized the fears and you just choose to not react to it, not resist it, but just to melt into it. All of a sudden, now you just kind of go, you you're flowing through it, and there's no resistance. So I go on to grab a drink with this person, and in my mind, I already know it's gonna be a kick-ass experience. I know because I'd like I had done a short little visualization and I put an intention to the experience side that I wanted to have, and as a result, it turned out exactly like that. And after that, I I was thinking to myself, I was like, man, how funny is that? Like, I was so before I was so afraid to have this interaction, to have this meeting with this person, but as a result of having this meaning, like if if certain things happen, it could completely change the trajectory of my business and my life. But isn't that true of all the experiences? If you think of the experiences that you've been pushing back or shying away from, why is it that you are pushing back? There is a fear there that's present. You have to identify the real the fear, but also realize the fear is a shit, right? It's purely made up, it's made up in your head, right? You're you know, I I love the quote that says the worry is your imagination go on wrong. And my imagination goes wrong all the time. Like all the time. I I I tend to worry about the stupidest things about and um but when you catch yourself with that, then all of a sudden now you can choose to respond differently without going on a tangent. When um the one life blueprint, the uh my course that I I created, I've been doing it myself, and when I am uh going throughout my day, I will often pull out like the awareness section. When I say pull out the awareness section, meaning I will um I'll take uh the questions that I would ask on that. And really what I'm doing is once when I'm bringing awareness to a category of my life, what I'm really saying is what are the thoughts that are controlling this area of my life? What are the thoughts that I'm having on a day-to-day basis? Right? Because you, your, your experience of any category of your life is directly related to the thoughts you have about it. You don't believe me? Monitor your thoughts for one day. You would be surprised if you if this is a complete foreign, uh, foreign concept to you, your mind's gonna be blown. If you think about the the thoughts you were having on a regular basis, I realized that I was worrying for people that had nothing to do with me. You know, friends are going through experiences, I was almost experiencing as if it were my experience. And it's stupid because you're taking on stuff that doesn't belong to you. And the same thing was I was happening with my business. I would think about um, you know, uh coffee roasting, right? Like uh about having a facility, not having facility. And the thing that was keeping me back was fear, right? Fear that I may not be able to handle it, fear of being locked, like of locked down. And there is some truth to it, right? There is some truth if I if I have a location that does limit you, right? Because whatever you decide to put your energy in it, it's at the expense or cost of something else. Meaning, if I decide that I am gonna go do a month in Sri Lanka, that's my next trip. At least that's what I think my next trip is. If I'm gonna do a month in Sri Lanka, that means the entire month that I'm away, I cannot do something else, right? It's gonna, I have to sacrifice something else. So there is a real cost to any decision that you make. But where you can get thrown off is by making the decision unconsciously by a shitty set of beliefs that you aren't even aware of. So the point of this is that how do the how does this like, you know, bringing awareness to these crappy beliefs that are controlling your life and leaning into fear, how do they, how do they like, how are they related? Because when you lean into the fear and you rest into it and then you you become friends with it, you realize that it was just made up in your mind that it was it was just the shitty belief, right? That's why they're related. So the point on me, the point of me coming up here to to speak with you today was just so you can start to identify those fears in your own life. And when I say identify those fears in your own life, what I'm really knowing, you're gonna get a you'll be in your day, you'll feel the damn jolt because it's gonna knock you off, right? You're gonna be feeling good, or you wake up and you feel like pure butt, right? You you feel horrible when you wake up. What is it that's guiding you, right? There, you're there's a belief system that's guiding you. Or when someone's there and they all of a sudden you just get this uneasy feeling. What is that experience? And what if you were just non-reactive? What if you just lean into it? What if that new business concept that you were considering, what if you, instead of being afraid of the, you know, going to this production new space, what if you just leaned or rested into it? Last example of this was I just came from the roasting facility where I'm gonna be doing my coffee. And it's a mixed, I have a such a mixed set of emotion prior to going down there. I'm looking at it and I'm like, oh my God, like, God, I gotta, I gotta lug all the way down to Long Island City to roast coffee. This one roaster that I'm choosing to do my espresso on because it has all the controls I need. But nevertheless, right? So I should be excited. I should be excited that I'm going to create something uh that I've been wanting to do for my entire coffee career. But I'm focusing on like, oh God, I gotta drive on that, I gotta find parking. Uh, you know, then I have to create these new roasting profiles, and I'm spiraling, I'm going around and around. Then also, you know, like it makes me, I want to control the whole process and like, you know, have my own production facility, right? So there's all these things going on in my mind. Really, I just need to freaking chill out. I really just need to chill the hell out. And as I was driving down there, I changed the mindset because I noticed where I was going. I was like, you know what? Like, I'm lucky to be able to do this. Like, this is something that I've been wanting for a long time. And it's not to say that I have to go down here for the rest of my life, but this is this is a goal I've had, and I'm realizing that goal. That's awesome. What else is gonna happen? Oh, by me going down there, I'm now learning again on a different machine. And the coffee I was producing previously on uh this one roaster gave me one style of coffee, but I really like the style I'm gonna be able to create on this this new machine that I'll be roasting on. Great. Well, wow, that's actually something to celebrate, right? That's not something to be afraid of, that's not something to worry about or be angry about. This is something really, really good. And it came from just this, the whole thought process and starting to question just came from like resting into it and realized, you know what? Let me just enjoy this process, let me just see what happens. Like I'm horrible at telling the future, and if I'm guessing, you're probably horrible at guessing the future as well, right? So I I just said, let me just see what happens, and that's where I am now, and um that's what uh what inspired me to come on here and deliver that message to you because so much of life is beyond that comfort zone, beyond that box that we put ourselves in. And when you lean into it and you push your boundary a little bit further, you start to grow and you start to feel good, you start to get more of those positive emotions that you crave. So lean into the fear, identify it when you feel that thing, just relax, put yourself at ease, and move forward, anyways. It is the definition of courage. Courage is not this one giant action that takes you to the other side. It is the small actions that are done over and over and over that are courage. So I hope you enjoyed this podcast. I hope it helps you just to become a little bit more aware of one, the beliefs that you have around the different categories of your life, right? Maybe you're saying, like, oh, I can never lose weight on big boned, or like, oh, I'll never feel better, right? Be careful. Because with your words, you're programming yourself. And then also, uh, I like I just lost my train of thought, leaning into the fear, but and being away, and leaning into fear and just being aware of your belief system. That's it. So I hope this helps you in some way. I hope the stories realize it, like, there's really not a lot to be afraid of. There's no beast that's gonna get there. You're not gonna fall off a hundred-story building unless you're doing construction up there, but I don't think many people here listening to this podcast are. Just see what happens. Allow yourself to be curious and realize that really you could, you could, you can self-correct at any point in this. So that is uh that is it for this episode. I hope you enjoyed that. If you have any questions or comments, you can email that to me via my website at www.donnyrouse.com. That is d-o-n-n-y-r-a-us.com. And if you enjoy this episode, please just leave a a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, whatever one you're listening to, just leave a review. This is what helps more people hear about the one life podcast and gets people to hopefully get this movement where everyone is moving towards their one life. So that is all I've got for you guys. I hope you enjoy this episode. Remember, you only get one life. Live fully, live passionally, and most of all, live now. God bless you guys, and I will see you again soon.