Walk toward the fear.
Does that sound irrational? It shouldn’t.
Think about it: when you were a kid you were probably afraid of lots of things. When you finally had to face some of those fears head-on or deal with them in some other experiential way, that’s when you grew and began to get more perspective on life.
Fast forward — now you’re an adult and your fears are nothing like the monster under the bed, darkness, or sitting on Santa’s lap. I’ve noticed a funny thing about being an adult: it seems adults are much less likely to face our fears or take risks than children are, which is probably why we tend to stagnate and stop growing as individuals at some point. We become more risk and fear averse. Maybe it’s the result of all the times we got hurt, got burned on a deal, taken advantage of, embarrassed, etc. Maybe it’s partly due to our curiosity of the world waning as we grow older. Do we get to a point that we’re simply comfortable with our familiar surroundings and our current knowledge of the world, and anything beyond that extent is just mild curiosity that we’ll only explore if it’s convenient, like an international vacation?
I’ve figured out a few of my adult fears. They’re things like making bad financial or buying decisions, fear of failure, fear of being embarrassed/chastised/ridiculed when I’m wrong about something, fear of having to give up or lose things I’ve worked so hard to attain, fear of trying a new line of work only to find out I absolutely suck at it and having to retrench and make up for lost time.
Allow me to shift gears here however and share a quick story about confronting fear. So, my wife was telling me a story about how a friend of hers was on a hike and came abruptly upon a rattlesnake on the side of the trail. That distinct, telltale rattling sound let her know she was in his space, his “comfort zone”. She instantly turned around to head back the other way thinking “ohhhh, I don’t need this shit” when she stopped herself. At that moment, she had the realization that her fear was irrational and she shouldn’t let it deter her from her path. The snake realistically wouldn’t strike out unless provoked, so she gave it a wide berth and continued up the trail. Easy enough: acknowledge the fear, face it head on, realize the irrationality and move past it. Onward and forward, right?
Here’s where it gets interesting though: there was a woman coming down the trail at a good pace with her hat & sunglasses on, headphones in her ears, completely oblivious of her surroundings and on a direct path with Mr. Snake. She was probably within 6 feet of the rattler before my wife’s friend managed to get her attention and shock her back into the present reality — at which point she thanked her profusely for keeping her out of harm’s way.
I think you get the point here, but it really made me think about the degrees of effect it could have if we embrace and face the things we fear. How many friends, family, situations, opportunities are squandered or suffer because of our inability to face the things that make us uncomfortable?
So, here are 2 thoughts I want to leave you with:
1) What are you avoiding (and really ask yourself why)?
2) Maybe someone else needs you to walk toward the fear.
— Thanks for reading
