On Saturday, June 21, AWiBers joined the Round Table Discussion (RTD) on the topic ‘What would you do if you were not afraid?’ facilitated by Nahu S. Girma, Founder & Director of AWiB. The session began with introductions and participants shared their expectaitons.

Nahu asked participants to share their answers to three questions:

1. What would you do if you were not afraid?
2. What is the worst that could happen?
3. What’s the price to your freedom?

Participants openly shared what their fears were and explored where they originated with each other and how to combat them. Fear of not being accepted, fear of loneliness and abandonment, and fear of failure were among the fears shared. Nahu shared that it is important to look into what is holding us back from what we really want to be and do. She noted that it is important to process emotions rather than bypass them. She also shared that we connect more authentically with others when we first connect with ourselves.

Major Takeaways

• Avoidance, self doubt, perfectionism, being defensive, feeling disconnected, using distractions are all manifestations of our fears.
• It is important to dig deep and find the source of our fears, talk about it and seek therapy to resolve it long term.
• FEAR can be transformed to Feel your emotions, Embrace them, Act inspite of the fear and Repeat until your fear is deminished.
• Learn to challenge unhelpful thoughts and engage in self care and visualizing happy places.