We all have tremendous gifts we can offer the world, and then there are fears that hold us back, paralyze us from being ourselves or acting on our intuition and expressing our gifts.
Yes, it is always probable that a negative outcome may happen, however with the number of fears we may have only a few ones if any actually ever materialize as negative situations. However, many of the fears that never materialize drain all our energy and stop us from chasing our dreams and expressing our talents.
Besides the negative outcomes, many of us are simply paralyzed by the fear of being wrong, so much so that we seldom ever make decisions. The reality is if we make more decisions we will be “right” more times and we will have better overall outcomes. Furthermore, many of us don’t even realize that inaction or not making a decision is also a decision – a decision to let a non-ideal situation continue or get worse.
One of the key steps in life leadership hence is to be proactive in life, make decisions and act. And to do that we have to progressively drop our fears – fears of failure, fears of rejection, fear of ridicule, fear of not having what we want, fear of loosing something dear to us, fear of abandonment, and many forms of fears.
The thing about fear is that – almost every fear can be rationally justified in our minds and we can spend all our energies rationalizing and justifying our fears. We start playing so much defensively that we don’t end up creating much positive value in the world – which eventually becomes the real reason for negative outcomes.
Feed or Face?
Fears can not survive if they are not constantly fed. Starve them, just look fear in the face with calmness and it will melt away automatically. If one tries to fight fear it actually gets fed by the ensuing logic and internal mental debate. Just let fear be there and look at it impassionately and it will melt away. It can be as simple as saying to yourself – “At this moment I am afraid that … ” and stop thinking there and see how fear automatically disappears.
Start Small
Of course dropping fear is not easy. And if you start big and for whatever reason it misfires it strengthens your fear tendencies. The best approach is to start working on small fears – may be it can be a simple thing like telling a friend that you don’t feel like meeting them today. Then you ask you get comfortable with your abilities you can start tackling your larger fears.
I leave you here with an apt quote:
“I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.”
— Frank Herbert, Dune – Bene Gesserit Litany Against Fear
To follow in the series:
3. Overcome your limiting beliefs
4. Transform your relating style
5. Build consistency and habits