We have all felt fear. It’s an uncomfortable feeling that seems to paralyze us at certain moments, leaving us frozen or causing us to flee from the situation that triggered it.
In therapy, this feeling often takes center stage. I like to call it the “mother of all emotions.”
The fear of death, which stirs our survival instinct, can be seen as a profound “gift” granted to us for navigating life.
But for some reason, this emotion also has the most negative impact on us. Many clients in therapy have found themselves face-to-face with fear: the fear of losing their job, their health, a loved one, or the fear of failure…
It feels as though we disconnect from all that is beautiful and good in our lives when this emotion consumes us. Why does fear feel so uncontrollable? Why does it hold such power over us?
A Client’s Story: The Fear of Abandonment
Today, I want to share a follow-up story about the client from my previous post, who discovered that she was overwhelmed by an intense fear—the fear of abandonment—that was paralyzing her relationship.
Before diving into the therapy session, I invite you to close your eyes for a moment and see if you can feel fear within you.
If you do, let it rise to the surface and answer the following questions:
• What exactly am I afraid of?
• Why do I feel this fear?
• Does this fear support me, or does it hold me back?
• If it holds me back, in what ways?
• How does this fear influence my life, my decisions, and my choices?
• What would I do differently if this fear no longer controlled me?
Write your answers down for yourself.
The Therapy Session with the Client
Me: “In our last session, you realized that you’re unhappy because of your fear of abandonment. How does this fear affect your relationship with your spouse?”
Client: “I don’t trust him. I constantly feel like he’s cheating on me, lying to me, hiding something from me. I try to suppress these thoughts, but the same feeling in my stomach—this stabbing sensation—keeps coming back, and I can’t get rid of these thoughts.”
Me: “Can you identify the situations where this feeling arises?”
Client: “Yes, it happens when I don’t know where he is, or when he doesn’t answer the phone immediately, or when he’s typing something on the computer, and I don’t know who he’s talking to.”
Me: “What’s the common thread that makes you feel this way in these different situations?”
Client: “I’m not in control of the situation! I feel fine when I know exactly what he’s doing and where he is.”
Me: “So, am I understanding correctly that your fear of abandonment arises when you feel like you don’t have enough information and therefore don’t have control over the situation?”
Client: “Yes, I like having everything under my control, knowing everything. That way, I don’t feel the fear.”
Me: “And how often are you in such a controlled situation in your life and relationship?”
Client: “Very rarely…”
Me: “How do you usually act when this fear arises in you?”
Client: “I try to suppress it because I know it’s all in my head. But in the end, I still try to regain control by asking him who he’s talking to or where he is, etc. And that leads to fights, because no matter what he says, I don’t believe him.”
Although the client realizes that it’s all “created in her mind,” this awareness doesn’t help her resolve the situation. Suppressing the feeling only keeps the fear alive within her.
Me: “So, in reality, you’re not controlling the situation, your spouse, or even the fear within you, right?”
Client: “Yes… and it’s eating me alive. The more I try to suppress it, the faster and stronger it comes back, and often unexpectedly.”
Understanding Emotions and Suppression
I like to explain “feelings” to clients like this: all emotions within us are energy. The more we suppress them—whether instinctively (as a coping mechanism learned in childhood) or consciously—the more they accumulate within us.
If we think about how emotions affect our physical body, imagine what a large amount of suppressed fear can do to our body and health.
Or picture a big beach ball that you try to push underwater. At some point, it will inevitably pop back up to the surface.
Our feelings behave in the same way. The more we push them down, the more forcefully they resurface. The longer we suppress them, the more power they gain over us.
Fear works the same way. The more we try to suppress it, the more forcefully it rises within us, often catching us off guard, and ultimately takes control of our actions and decisions.
A Moment of Reflection
Me: “Close your eyes, take three deep breaths, and relax your whole body. Go back to the time when you first remember feeling this sensation in your stomach—that stabbing feeling.”
Client: “I’m in kindergarten. All the other kids have been picked up, their parents have come. My mom hasn’t come yet.”
Me: “What do you feel? Where is that feeling in your body?”
Client: “My stomach is twisting and stabbing. I feel sad. I’m afraid my mom won’t come, and I’ll be left here…”
We continued working with the client’s ‘inner wounded child.’ While the process is too lengthy to describe here, the key point is that the client connected with their fear of abandonment, which stemmed from childhood.
Therapy is, in many ways, “trauma work.”
Have you ever noticed how expressive children are? One moment, they’re laughing wholeheartedly, and the next, they’re crying or angry. They don’t suppress their emotions—they simply feel them and move on.
At some point, though, the world around us—parents, teachers, friends—begins to react to our emotions. We start learning that certain feelings are “wrong” or “unacceptable,” and we suppress them to “cope.” Over time, this suppression becomes automatic. We stop noticing our emotions as they rise, and instead, they get triggered by external events, taking control of us without us even realizing it.
The Healing Journey
Me: “Now that you know where your fear of abandonment originated, and your wounded child within has been acknowledged, how do you feel now? What’s happening in your body?”
Client: “I feel very calm right now. My body feels at peace.”
Me: “That feeling of fear isn’t in your body anymore—you’ve released it. The only way to stop suppressing emotions is to stop fearing them and to live them out in a way that doesn’t harm others. How do you feel now when you think about your spouse?”
Client: “I understand now that this feeling inside me came from long ago, and it’s not connected to him at all. I acted strangely, but I see now that because I kept suppressing the fear, it only grew and controlled me.”
Me: “What will you do differently now that you know this?”
Client: “I won’t suppress my feelings anymore. And I know my husband has nothing to do with this. I don’t need to control him anymore—it’s unnecessary. He wasn’t the cause of this feeling; I created the connection and the ‘solution’ in my head, but the feeling remained. It was the wrong solution.”
Me: “That’s a great insight! When we let a deeply stored emotion from the past take control and create a self-made ‘problem’ with a self-made ‘solution,’ it doesn’t help us at all. The key is to stay connected with yourself, notice when any feeling rises in your body, and not suppress it but let it pass through you. Just as we let joy flow out of us, we must also learn to release fear, pain, anger, etc., so they don’t control us.”
Final Exercise for You
If you did the exercise at the beginning of this post and wrote down answers to the questions, now turn the page over and answer one more:
• What will I do from now on when I feel fear rising within me?
Take another piece of paper and draw a picture titled “My Fear.”
Close your eyes and imagine your FEAR appearing before you. Look at it. Then, draw it on the paper in whatever form you perceive it—whether it’s a shape, a color, a word—anything that represents it.
From now on, whenever you feel fear rising within you, close your eyes and visualize the image you just created. Befriend your “fear.” When it arises and tries to take control, allow it to come up—don’t suppress it. Simply observe it, and then let it go.
Your fear is not you! Your emotions are not you! You are the one who notices these emotions within yourself.
Learn to live with your feelings so that they don’t control you. Instead, you control them. And the first step is overcoming your “fear” of your own emotions…
“Let fear be a counselor and not a jailer.”
— Tony Robbins