Fear of Success is a Weighty Issue

Dear Colette,

I am on the verge of self-publishing my spiritual memoir, and I saw my extra weight as me carrying my unfulfilled life purpose on my body, but also carrying spiritual light in my body.  You speak about carrying the weight of the world on our bodies so I thought you might have some insights as to what is making me put on these extra pounds, without eating more or exercising less. ~ Heavy Burden

Dear Heavy Burden,

Many times our fear of success will also create a need to pad ourselves with protection. Exposing ourselves to the public with our ideas can be a daunting thing.  I’ve seen it with some of my clients where they’re about to launch a project and they start putting on a lot of weight, and when we delve into our coach/client conversation we find out that at the basis of that they’re trying to be seen by the public but they’re afraid to be really seen so their body becomes larger. They feel that they’ve never been heard and this is the first time their words will be heard and so instead of just being the bright light that shines out into the world their bodies grow instead. So they say ‘see, you can’t miss me, look how big I am.’

Also the idea of somebody carrying spiritual light could also be the idea that we can’t always contain our new growth and it’s almost like we grown faster, we grow spiritually faster than our bodies can keep up. This is strictly theory but from what I’ve seen in other people, it is not uncommon that these confusing periods of weight gain happen prior to becoming noticed by the public.

So your weight gain can be either one or the other, or both:  (1) to make yourself noticeable but in a way that you don’t want to be noticed, and (2) the weight gain is a result of the stress of protecting yourself from the possibility of failure or success. You’re afraid that people will actually hear you and listen to you—which would be new—and there’s also the idea that you could possibly be somehow rejected (that there will be no success).

I am wishing you not only success, but also the enjoyment of success absent of fear.

Love and blessings,

Colette Baron-Reid

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