When I first started my business, absolutely everything about it scared me. Every time I shared content on social media, I wanted to hide under the bed afterwards.
When I met new people and they asked me what I did, I mumbled something about starting this thing “but we’ll see how it goes,” before excusing myself to hide in the bathroom.
Being visible online, hearing other people’s opinions of what I did and potentially failing publicly all felt terrifying to me, especially when I was still figuring out what exactly I was offering.
I knew rationally that nothing truly terrible would happen. There was a chance I would fail or look a little bit silly to some people, but I was not actually in danger. And yet, I felt a physical panic taking over my body every time I took a step.
I believe we all have fears that may seem irrational, but that have a big impact on our lives. Fear comes in many different flavors and forms. Perhaps your fears are similar to mine and have to do with failure, visibility, and the judgment of others.
Or maybe your fears are around relationships: the fear of opening up to someone and then getting your heart broken. I have clients who fear ending up alone, getting sick, or losing all their money and possessions.
Sometimes these fears are based on our previous experiences, our upbringing or beliefs that were instilled in us when we were children. Maybe you can pinpoint a specific event that led to this fear, or perhaps it was a fear that one of your parents felt and passed on to you.
Or maybe your fears are more mysterious, and you can’t really trace them to anything in particular. Part of the process is accepting that your fear is valid even when it seems irrational.
When you share your fears with friends, they might not understand how they can be such a big deal to you. Likewise, their fears may seem insignificant and easy to overcome to you. When you learn to accept that certain things feel terrifying to you, regardless of whether others agree, you also create the space to accept the fears of your loved ones.
Fear is often experienced through both your mind and your body.
Fear is partly something that is in your head: it comes in the form of overthinking, worrying, going through all the doom scenarios that could possibly happen. It shows up as self-doubt, your inner critic telling you that you are not good enough or not ready.
It also comes with physical sensations: a tightness in your muscles, shortness of breath, nausea, and an increased heartbeat. Perhaps you feel a tendency to run, escape what you fear or distract yourself from the intense feelings.
When you start paying attention to them, you often experience the physical sensations before the thoughts. It is like your body registers what is happening before your mind has time to catch up.
Your mind and body are connected: your thoughts can bring up physical sensations, and your physical symptoms drive your thoughts. When your nervous system is calm, your thoughts will settle and feel calmer as well.
My extreme fear-based reaction to taking tiny steps made me think I wasn’t ready or I was not meant to be doing this. Maybe if I worked on feeling more confident first, I could try again. But to my disappointment, I found that I didn’t magically wake up one day feeling confident.
Confidence is something that grows as we take steps and gradually move in the direction of what scares us. To get there, we need to go through the uncomfortable phase.
On the other end of the spectrum, the most common advice I got from people around me was something along the lines of “just do it, dive right in, face your fears.” And sometimes, that is the best advice.
At times, we get stuck in overanalyzing and what ifs (I know I do), so just doing it without a lot of time to think can be the great. It often feels amazing afterwards, a mix of nervousness and excitement.
But diving right in isn’t always the answer. When you force yourself to move faster than your nervous system can handle, you end up feeling overwhelmed. Your self-protection mechanisms will come up, and you might decide that it’s better to stay as far away from you fear as you can.
When you slowly move towards what you fear while giving your nervous system time to adjust, you create a sustainable change as you become more resilient to that fear. Rather than taking a big leap at once, you can work towards it in small but consistent steps.
You then build the foundation for it to no longer feel like a big leap at all, but rather like the next logical step to take.
Your nervous system is here to protect you from danger. Even though your life is not actually in danger, your body can’t tell the difference. Taking the time to allow your nervous system to adjust and know that it is safe to move forward, while using tools to ground yourself in the process, allows the fear to dissolve over time.
This doesn’t mean that you should avoid that which you fear, but that instead of going for a 10/10 scary thing, you can choose to pick a 2 or 3 first. Something that is in the general direction of the 10 but that feels manageably scary.
When you give yourself time to notice the physical sensations that come up and integrate the fear, you teach your nervous system that you can handle it. When you move up to something that felt like a 5 or 6 before, it probably won’t feel overwhelming anymore.
Finding the sweet spot where something makes you nervous, but in a way that you can handle, allows you to build resilience for fear, one step at a time.
Behind your fears are often some of your greatest longings. Moving towards your fear can therefore bring you what you truly desire.
But progress does not always have to be a “jump right in” moment. It can be a gradual process where you honor your own needs and don’t force yourself into something that you don’t feel quite ready for. Your process is unique to you, just like your fears and longings are yours alone.
Acknowledging what you need to move forward is a great form of self-care and allows space for joy and fun in doing scary, uncomfortable things.
Some days you will feel brave enough to take a leap and do a big scary thing. Some days, you won’t. And that is totally okay. You can still make progress when you take tons of tiny steps that feel slightly scary and gently grow your courage and confidence over time.
