Are you like me, the more you set goals, dream and push forward in your life the more fear you experience? I’ve talked with many others who have experienced this same challenge – it’s almost like forward motion is automatically subject to resistance, and in this case, the resistance is within your in the form of irrational fear.
When you set the bar higher, need to operate outside of your comfort zone, take on an element of higher risk or experience situations you haven’t experienced before (or have had bad experiences with in the past) you begin the negative self talk that begins to feed fear within you.
Take public speaking. For most of us, the prospect of getting up in front of strangers (or sometimes worse, our peers) is extraordinarily frightening. The more time we have to think and stew about it, the worse the fear gets. I know personally when I am faced with a situation that instills fear in me, the longer I have to wait to complete the task or get through the situation the worse because I get myself all wound up.
So much of our fear is an irrational response we internally have to a completely objective situation or experience in our lives…which means we CAN control it.
Do we "fight" fear?
Do we "disallow" fear?
Do we "ignore" fear?
What is the best way to deal with fear in our lives when we seek to achieve greater levels of personal and professional achievement?
What has worked best for me is to first recognize fear (it is not always apparent to us, but to others we act differently), then look objectively at what it is we fear. I then try and put fear into perspective…often when we consider what is likely to happen we can recognize how irrational our thinking has been leading to heightened peaks of fear.
So, the goal is NOT to eliminate fear, for that just masks what is really going on and can lead to further problems, but rather recognize it and place fear into perspective so that you can carry on without your behavior or thinking impacted by your fear.
What do you think…should you fight fear or embrace it and deal with it?
Jeff
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