What would you do - whether it concerns life or work - if you were not afraid of anything? Such a simple question awakens countless fantasies, desires and regrets.
If the fear of failure or seeming like a complete idiot has ever held you back from doing what your heart called for, you will need some very important advice from business consultant Sandya Bruegmann. There is no need to fight fear. Just accept it and don’t let your worries slow you down on the path to your dream.
Usually we consider fear as an unpleasant emotion, which we try to avoid with all our might. Fear literally paralyzes, so instincts willy-nilly switch to survival mode. Unfortunately, such behavior can lead to actions that have nothing to do with moving towards our goals.
Sandya Brugmann
business consultant
In other words, if you let fear control you, you may forget about success.
This is especially dangerous for entrepreneurs. Running a business can be a scary and exciting experience in itself: it involves taking on financial responsibilities, dealing with frustrated clients or employees, and realizing that the decisions you make affect not only your well-being, but also the lives of other people.
On the other hand, Brugmann notes, fear is an emotion inherent in humans by nature. You won’t be able to get rid of it once and for all, and you don’t need to.
We are not faced with the task of curbing fear and preventing its occurrence in the future. Our goal is to understand what it is and learn to act based on willpower and without burying our heads in the sand.
Richard Branson phrased the same idea a little differently.
Fear sometimes makes you wet yourself, but courage makes you act even in wet pants.
Richard Branson
entrepreneur, founder of Virgin Group
The metaphor is not the most elegant, but it conveys the essence absolutely correctly: do not give up on your dreams because of fears, just accept them as part of life. Here are some tips to help you stop being afraid and start doing something.
Embrace your fear
As with any similar work on oneself, it all starts with thoughtful reflection and self-acceptance. When working with fear, we must clearly understand that our main goal is to prevent fears and anxieties from imposing their conditions and controlling our lives.
Nevertheless, fear is characteristic of every person and all living beings, because it is dictated by instincts, including the instinct of self-preservation. These are pure emotions that cannot be gotten rid of, but which can and should be worked with.
- FAQs How to overcome fear: 13 steps to help you stop being afraid A selection of tips that will help you cope with various phobias and start living happier.
Thus, first of all, we must accept our fears and learn to act in accordance with them, without deviating from our intended goals.
Billionaire Richard Branson once said that fear sometimes makes us wet ourselves, but courage allows us to continue to the end even with wet pants. This idea is formulated very succinctly and clearly conveys the attitude that we should form towards the fear of acting. We cannot afford to neglect our plans, we need to accept these concerns and make them part of the creative process.
How not to be afraid and start living: 10 recommendations from Dale Carnegie
A world-famous American psychologist created the concept of conflict-free interaction, a program for self-improvement, eloquence, and, of course, the art of a balanced life in harmony. Let's look at some tips from his book.
"Iron Doors"
The first thing you need to take care of is the distinction between the present, past and future. The scientist proposes to mentally establish a strong curtain between these periods. After all, you need to lead your life now, without regretting what happened and without worrying about what will happen. These thoughts only increase anxiety.
"Magic" formula
This is the development of American inventor Willis Carrier. Its essence is that:
- you need to ask yourself: “What’s the worst thing that could happen to me?”;
- come to terms with it;
- think about actions that can change the situation.
"Momento mori"
Realize that anxiety causes enormous damage to your health. As an example, Carnegie cites the fact that businessmen who do not know how to cope with anxiety die too early. After all, these emotions affect nerve cells. And the more often a person is exposed to this condition, the less time he has to live.
Positive thinking
To protect yourself from fear, a person needs to create a special state of mind that brings harmony and joy. It can be developed through cheerful thoughts, actions and obtaining happiness from life.
Activity
Unemployment is one of the reasons for concerns. If an individual is not doing anything, his consciousness automatically generates anxiety. Therefore, if you want to rid yourself of this, load yourself up with intense work.
Habit Replacement
Anxiety is a rather harmful habit that needs to be eliminated. The most effective way is to replace it with another, more useful one. Don't be upset by the troubles - this will be an excellent replacement.
Low probability
The advice is related to the Law of Large Numbers. It lies in the fact that periodically it is worth asking: what is the chance that what I am afraid of will happen to me? According to the theory presented, it is too small.
Resignation to the Inevitability
Many people continue to worry even when something bad has already happened. Avoid this. After all, if it is impossible to change what is happening, take it for granted and calm down.
"Limiter" of anxiety
It is needed to control emotions. To establish it means to determine for yourself what degree of fear a particular phenomenon deserves. Set a limit that you absolutely cannot go beyond.
Interest in people
Fears also arise at a time when a person is fixated on himself. Therefore, be interested in others, do good deeds even for strangers. And you will be surprised at the result.
Learn to work with criticism and objections
Each of us needs to clearly distinguish between biased attacks intended to tease a person and objective criticism, which can be the most valuable advice. Unfortunately, our defense mechanisms often cause us to take valuable criticism with hostility. Thus, we lose the ability to rationally evaluate our activities.
You need to work with this problem and try to listen to the opinions of others.
Sometimes we are afraid of negative reviews and public censure, but all innovators and experimenters have gone through this. Denial is an integral stage of accepting something new and unknown. Remember this.
Event Analysis
Reflections on life help answer the question: how not to be afraid of anything? You need to not just think about what happened, but analyze the situation in detail. Why did this happen to you? Have similar events happened before? How did you feel? With a little research, you'll likely discover that your fears are bogus.
Your fear is the result of negative experiences received in childhood and adolescence. Conversations with spiritually developed people and confidential conversations have a positive impact. Indeed, in most cases, a person simply needs the attention and support of others. Misunderstanding and loneliness only undermine strength and interfere with personal growth.
Use fear to your advantage
Any fear can be viewed through the lens of a useful opportunity. In other words, fear can show us the direction of growth and generally show us who we really are.
If we look at fears from this angle, they can become our points of growth. Over time, you may even develop a feeling of gratitude for past vulnerabilities. Some successful people consider fears to be their gift. With their help they learn and overcome difficulties.
Naturally, this approach is achieved through hard work on yourself, but with it, life will become much more interesting and exciting.
Fight toxic thoughts
Some thoughts that arise in our head can be truly destructive and have nothing to do with reality. Sometimes in moments of failure we tend to blame ourselves for what happened, doubt our own competence and generally lose hope of success.
Naturally, you shouldn’t go into the jungle of self-destruction. You need to realize that not everything works out the first time, and mistakes and failures are good moments for analyzing your activities.
- FAQs Do you have a phobia? 6 most common fears in the world (and how to overcome them)
You can immerse yourself in toxic thoughts and spin them to incredible proportions, but it is better to try to prevent this and continue to move towards your dream.
Help from a psychologist
Let's start with the fact that in situations like yours, you need to use collective support, because it is very difficult to cope alone. Nowadays, going to a psychologist is the norm. Psychotherapy has made a huge leap in development over the past ten years, and not using it now is a crime. Yes, in Russia many people do not consider psychology a science, and then they wonder why their wives leave them and their children stop communicating in every possible way. And if their prejudices are alien to you, then take the help of a specialist.
Nowadays, there are many psychological support groups that are created for a variety of purposes - from helping to cope with the loss of a loved one to helping with communication difficulties. But if for some reason such support is not available to you, you will have to resort to other methods.
Start dedicating yourself completely to what you love
Sometimes, in order to overcome fears and apprehensions, you need to be so passionate about the goal that obstacles in the form of mental barriers seem like light bumps on the long road of achievement.
To take this road, you need to find your favorite thing and completely immerse yourself in it. This kind of obsession (in a positive sense) will help you deal with your fears and concerns more easily.
The main thing is to fully believe in what you are doing and at least approximately see the final goal.
If you don't know how to do anything
There is hardly a person who can’t do anything at all. More often, the statement “I can’t do anything” means that a person does not know how to do something that would bring him a lot of money. This is not a unique situation: if we look at it from this perspective, it turns out that about 80% of the population does not know how to do anything. This means that we have determined that you probably know how to do something—maybe even quite well. You knew how to do something before, you had some hobby or interest in childhood. If you don’t have much to lose in terms of salary, then do exactly what you are somehow good at.
This is actually a controversial issue. I would probably like to object and suggest learning new skills. The offer, of course, is good, new “skills” are always good, but what will be “more profitable” is unknown. It can take years to master a new skill or a new profession. Moreover, the result is not guaranteed: at what level this skill will be mastered is unknown. For example, Photoshop: anyone can use it. But for some, this is a way to insert text into a picture, turning it into a meme, and for others, it is a source of good income. Bruce Lee stands on the other side (suddenly) and reminds that he is not afraid of a person who learns 1,000 different techniques, but he is afraid of a person who repeats the same technique 1,000 times. If you are already good at something, then perhaps in the same years you will be able to develop the skill to the highest level. This could actually be more useful than looking for a new profession.
Try to relax more often
Of course, you shouldn’t overexert yourself and work until you lose your pulse. The human body needs to recharge both mentally and physically.
Therefore, learn to relax when your mind and body ask for it. For this, meditation, massage sessions, computer games, going to the movies and museums, and classic hangouts with friends will be effective.
Just find for yourself those activities that most accurately meet your needs and do not allow yourself to overheat in the fight against fears.
If you are poor
If a person is poor, the first thing he needs to do is rethink his spending. Most likely, it will turn out that almost half of the money literally goes nowhere, is spent on nothing. For example, food: you can easily save on it, and you don’t need to immediately imagine buckwheat on sale. Some shawarma or other fast food costs 150–200 rubles - this is a one-time snack. But for the same money you can cook a whole pan of budget soup, which will not only taste better, but it will also last for a long time. You just need to learn how to cook simple dishes and devote a couple of hours every three to four days to this task.
Other unnecessary expenses, such as cigarettes, booze, and especially loans, need to be rethought in the same way. This may surprise you, but loans are just entertainment for the rich; the poor cannot afford them. Add mobile communications and home Internet to this - often people pay for “options” that they do not use at all. The amounts seem to be small (one hundred here, one and a half here), but in the end everything together adds up to half of your monthly budget. If you give up such things, the standard of living will not decrease at all, and may even increase slightly in some aspects. At the same time, at least some (albeit small) money will be freed up. It's still better than wasting it.
Share your experiences with loved ones
You don’t have to go around to all your friends and tell them about what you’re afraid of. This way you can scare off your social circle. It is best to share your experiences with a few of the closest people in whom you are absolutely confident.
This could be either your loved one or an old friend who has always acted as a kind of psychotherapist for you (surely many of us have such).
- FAQs: 11 fears in the life of a modern man
Tell them what worries you, what worries you are experiencing, and listen to their opinion. Quite often, after such conversations, our self-confidence strengthens and we leave charged for new achievements. Don't be afraid to share problems, because it's often much harder to deal with them alone.
What do people fear most?
The number of fears accumulated by a person by mid-life is incalculable. Most people hide their phobias, afraid (again, afraid) to appear funny in the eyes of others, who, in turn, hide the fear behind feigned bravado.
Read more: 20 tips on how to develop grit and strength of character
Based on opinion polls in which several thousand people around the world took part, a rating of “What a person fears most” was compiled.
- Loneliness.
- Death.
- Social phobia.
- Spiders, rats, cockroaches, snakes, etc.
- Intimacy.
- Madness.
- Bacteria and germs (verminophobia).
- Cowardice.
- Poisoning.
- Old age.
Interestingly, the fear of being alone and rejected by society prevails over the fear of death. Although this state of affairs is confirmed by facts, when criminals who committed atrocities at sea preferred to be hanged in their homeland than to be left on a desert island.
Forget about past negative experiences
If you once had a negative experience, after which you acquired new fears and worries, you should not dwell on it and replay it in your head over and over again. Try to accept it and return to it as little as possible.
Just remember that the past cannot be returned, no matter how hard we try. Moreover, it is far from a fact that a negative experience once received should be repeated. We all make mistakes, we all stumble and get into trouble. But this does not mean at all that we should allow circumstances to get the better of us and break our will to move.
Think more about the present and the future, because this is what we have yet to experience.
If you're stupid
If a person understands that he is stupid, then he is definitely not completely stupid. A complete and complete fool never recognizes himself as such. Therefore, if you are aware of the problem, then everything is not so bad. There are only two ways: easy and difficult.
You can just become smarter - you know, self-development and all that. The tactic is this: first listen, then listen again and again; then start reading, then read and read some more. After this you will be able to talk about some topics. If you delve even into one thing, but really deeply, you will lose the honorary title of a fool. Then the development process turns into a “snowball”, which rolls on its own, and various knowledge sticks to it on its own.
There is a more difficult way: to remain silent more often. This is surprising, but, as a rule, the stupider a person is, the more often his mouth is open. Not only “amazing facts” fly out from there, but also dozens of tips on any occasion, on any issue. So, if a stupid person realizes himself as such and decides to remain silent more, he automatically becomes smarter than half of those around him. However, this path is indeed more difficult. Firstly, it will not always be possible to remain silent, especially under the influence of alcohol. Secondly, this is still a fake victory, because the real state of affairs will not change.
See a psychotherapist
Try to see a good psychotherapist. Believe me, this is a common practice that helps improve the quality of life: many successful people resort to it. Although, of course, turning to a specialist is another fear that some also need to overcome. But we hope you will succeed if you really need competent and competent therapy.
Some of us may indeed have mental problems that we cannot cope with on our own. In this case, only an expert can help.
- FAQs Online psychotherapy is better than offline: 5 secrets that will help you get the most out of video calling. It may be unusual, but it’s worth a try.
- Author: Dmitry Petrosyants
Sleep paralysis - what is it?
This is another of the strong fears of people. It is connected with the fact that you wake up, but you are in a state between awakening and sleep. You can’t move, you’re completely immobilized. And the most frightening thing is that various hallucinations begin to appear, they are different for everyone. I had this happen, it was just terrible.
Some people associate sleep paralysis with a brownie who is trying to show what he doesn’t like about his owners. Believing is up to everyone, but there is a good way to get out of this state.
If you realize that you have been overcome by sleep paralysis, start moving, but not sharply and quickly, but slowly, very slowly, with each part of your body in turn. And if you believe in spirits, then read the Our Father prayer.
