Fear Archives - Chantal Breytenbach Coaching

What does it mean to thrive?

Over the last two years I have sat with this question: What does it mean to thrive? I used to believe that if I could achieve enough outside success, then I would thrive.

When I started my coaching business, I read The Prosperous Coach, in the hopes that I could figure out how to prosper – which is another word for thrive. I was longing to find the secret to thriving / prospering / flourishing / expanding. And I will be honest, initially I thought that I would feel like I was thriving if I were making more money and if I was really successful in my business… […]

A year in the rear-view mirror

Posted on November 17, 2025By ChantalPosted in Completions / Courage / Emotional Agility / Failure / Fear / Future Self / Goals / Gratitude / Grief / Grit / Happiness / In the muck / Inspiration / Integrity / Leadership / Life / Meaning / Mindfulness / Mindset / Perspective / Purpose / Self-care / Slow down / Story Matters

At the end of each year, I complete a Year-End Review. I spend time looking back at the year in granular form. I go and look at one month and one week at a time. What am I looking for? I look at what was happening both personally and professionally. I look at my calendar and my business tracking to see who I was serving, where I was travelling to, and what felt important during each moment in time. I reflect on how I felt, and how I was relating to all that was occurring. Why do I do this?

I complete this detailed Year-End Review every year, because it gives me the opportunity to reflect on my life from a zoomed-out perspective with new knowledge that I didn’t have at the time that the events were occurring. It often has me change my perspective on the story I tell myself about the year I just had. And it ensures that I tell myself the truth instead of just holding on to a story… […]

The value of facing our Demons…

Posted on November 12, 2025By ChantalPosted in Compassion / Connection / Courage / Emotional Agility / Failure / Fear / Future Self / Grief / Happiness / In the muck / Inspiration / Integrity / Leadership / Life / Love / Meaning / Mindfulness / Mindset / Perspective / Resilience / Self-care / Slow down / Story Matters / Thriving

I want to start this article a little differently to how I would usually start a post. I want to start by sharing this funny video that captures my evolution with KPop Demon Hunters in 15 seconds. And if you don’t know what KPop Demon Hunters are, welcome to the movement. May it inspire you as much as it has inspired me.

If you are not a fan, that is totally fine too. I feel a little sad for you. And, you don’t need to a be fan, or even have watched the movie, to get value from this article. It’s just my starting point, and it doesn’t need to be yours. So, just hang in here with me for a little bit as I provide some background to why this movie, why this article, and why now? […]

It’s OK if you are NOT OK

Posted on November 2, 2025By ChantalPosted in Commitment / Compassion / Courage / Emotional Agility / Fear / Grief / Grit / In the muck / Integrity / Leadership / Life / Love / Meaning / Mindset / Self-care / Slow down / Thinking

A minor car accident a month ago was a wake-up call for me. It made me pause and had me face the truth of where I am right now. It’s been seven months since my father’s passing. Since then, my mother, my mother-in-law, and my father-in-law have all been ill this year. And the day before my birthday, my aunt passed away. I have felt myself reeling with shock and confusion over the past eight weeks. I wish I could tell you that I was wise and calm during these intense weeks, but I have not been wise and calm. Far from it. I have fallen into old defensive patterns in a futile attempt to make myself feel safe… […]

Are you judging how you are showing up?

Posted on September 15, 2025By ChantalPosted in Compassion / Courage / Decision-Making / Emotional Agility / Failure / Fear / In the muck / Inspiration / Integrity / Leadership / Life / Mindset / Perspective / Self-care / Story Matters / Thinking / Thriving

During the Summer I took a trip to Whistler with my family. Whistler is a town north of Vancouver, British Columbia, that’s home to Whistler Blackcomb, one of the largest ski resorts in North America. People go there to ski in the Winter, and they go there for adventure biking in the Summer. There is a cable-car (gondola) that takes you up Whistler Mountain. Additionally, there is another gondola that takes you between the two peaks of Whistler Mountain and Blackcomb Mountain. This is called the Peak-to-Peak gondola and is an epic ride up the mountain.

Once you are half-way up Whistler Mountain, there is an option to take an open chairlift to the peak of Whistler Mountain. The Peak Express chairlift is your access to the Top of the World Summit, Cloudraker Skybridge and Raven’s Eye Lookout. This chairlift ride is an exhilarating experience that takes you over top of an ancient glacier while cresting over a 100-foot vertical cliff at the top.

I have a morbid fear of falling – not heights, I’m pretty ok with being high up. I’m terrified of falling though, so I don’t like feeling like I might fall. So, going up the mountain in an open chairlift was not an option I was even considering. It was clear in my mind that that was something I could not do… […]

The Truth about Perfectionism

Posted on August 6, 2025By ChantalPosted in Authenticity / Celebrations / Commitment / Compassion / Courage / Emotional Agility / Failure / Fear / Goals / Gratitude / Grief / Happiness / In the muck / Inspiration / Integrity / Leadership / Life / Love / Meaning / Mindfulness / Mindset / Passion / Perspective / Purpose / Resilience / Slow down / Story Matters / Thriving

In April of this year, I did a thing. With the gentle nudging of my coach, I participated in a professional rebranding photo shoot. The photo shoot took place in the midst of tremendous grief and sorrow. I was still reeling from the shock of my father’s passing. If I’m being honest, I’m still reeling from it now. There are days where the grief of it is so intense that my heart physically aches, and the tears have a valve of their own that cannot be turned off…

And yet, the photos are more real, more authentic, more true than any photos I have ever taken. They reflect someone who is more grounded, more present, more connected to herself, Life, and others. They reflect who I am without any filters or pretense. They are raw and real. They are vulnerable. They are beautiful.

This photo shoot in April was not some spur of the moment, spontaneous event. It was part of a much larger agreement with my coach to start to see myself more clearly, to claim the value of the work that I do, and to realign my brand to clearly reflect that. It was part of a project called “Seeing Myself”.

Why am I sharing this with you, and what does seeing myself have to do with the title of this article? Everything really. When we slow it down… […]

What do you believe to be true about you?

Posted on June 15, 2025By ChantalPosted in Authenticity / Commitment / Compassion / Courage / Failure / Fear / Gratitude / Grief / In the muck / Inspiration / Integrity / Leadership / Life / Love / Meaning / Mindset / Perspective / Purpose / Resilience / Story Matters / Thinking / Thriving / Transformation

My father died believing he was a failure. From his perspective, he had failed, because he had been unable to secure full-time employment after losing his job during the pandemic. He lost his house and had almost no money when he died. He based a lot of his self worth on external measures of success, and he believed that he did not measure up. However, that’s now what I saw or believed… […]

Who do you become when faced with what matters most to you?

Posted on May 28, 2025By ChantalPosted in Authenticity / Commitment / Connection / Courage / Failure / Fear / Grief / In the muck / Inspiration / Leadership / Life / Listening / Love / Meaning / Perspective / Purpose / Self-care / Slow down / Story Matters / Values

A few weeks ago, in conversation with a client, she asked a powerful question: How do I know what my truth is? The answer to that question is multi-layered. Here’s why… […]

Little earthquakes: How grief and trauma shapes us

Posted on May 8, 2025By ChantalPosted in Commitment / Compassion / Connection / Courage / Emotional Agility / Fear / Gratitude / Grief / In the muck / Inspiration / Integrity / Leadership / Life / Love / Mindfulness / Mindset / Perspective / Slow down / Story Matters / Transformation

I recently finished reading, Little Earthquakes: A memoir by Sarah Mandel where she recounts the heartbreaking story of her six year long battle with stage four metastatic breast cancer and the ensuing trauma that unfolded from that. Mandel was a therapist who used narrative therapy to help her clients work through their trauma, and then chose to apply her own therapy methods in the writing of her memoir. It was a way for her to make sense of the trauma she had walked through… […]

What’s the difference between self-improvement and self-growth?

Posted on January 21, 2025By ChantalPosted in Authenticity / Bias for action / Commitment / Completions / Courage / Dreaming / Failure / Fear / Future Self / Goals / Grit / Happiness / In the muck / Inspiration / Integrity / Leadership / Life / Meaning / Mindfulness / Mindset / Perspective / Planning / Purpose / Self-care / Slow down / Thinking / Thriving / Transformation

Usually in January we hear a lot of talk about goals, dreams, aspirations, ways that we are going to be better and do better. This time of year tends to be a time when there is a heavy focus on self-improvement. Although, I will say that this year, I feel like the energy is different. I don’t know if it’s only on my side of the world, or whether you have experienced something similar? And I’m attributing it to all that is occurring in the world at the moment – wars, elections, wildfires. One colleague said what I was thinking. He said, “It feels like it’s the pandemic all over again…”

I will share that that is certainly where my fear-based mind went immediately, because I remember that there were these out-of-control wildfires in Australia at the beginning of 2020 just before the pandemic really hit. And if you are feeling less inspired and excited this January, I want to invite you to be gentle and compassionate with yourself. My sense is that in many ways, we are still recovering from the trauma of the pandemic, and that our nervous systems are constantly bombarded with more things to process. And it’s a lot. It really is.

And this is why I want to discuss the difference between self-improvement and self-growth… […]