The Other Side: an interlude on fear

There’s an old adage about how those who are brave don’t lack fear, they just choose to act in the face of that fear. Many of us believe that we can’t be confident until we erase all of our fears. We don’t realize how much this holds us back until a moment comes that calls on us to be brave. These moments look different for all of us but no matter who you are you can’t run from them. Some people may have fear about something tangible out in the world and for others it’s more ephemeral, something mental. Whatever it is prevents us from living a full life. I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately as I journey down the path of breakdowns & breakthroughs. Like many of us, I’m great at talking my way around fear and rationalizing why I don’t face it. We all do mental gymnastics to avoid doing hard things. In the end, though, we can’t run forever. Despite being confident in many ways there are certain areas that I need to break through to continue moving forward. I don’t think I’m alone in this, I think a lot of people are suffering from fear in silence right now, and together we can find a way forward. 

The fear I’m talking about isn’t the natural response to real danger in the world. You need to listen to that type of fear because it’s protecting you from that danger. What I’m talking about is that smaller more subtle fear, the fear that causes you to doubt yourself or your actions. While your brain may think it’s protecting you it’s not. It’s the fear that makes you think “I’m scared that I can’t do it” or “What if doesn’t work out”. Many people would call this anxiety, and that’s true, but anybody with anxiety would tell you that fear is a huge part of it. This mix of fear of anxiety is what blocks you from moving forward. If we’re anxious about something, why do we avoid it? Because we’re scared. We’re scared of the possibility that the anxiety could be right. We’re scared of the what if. Fear crystalizes that anxiety, it makes it real.

This type of fear has sharply risen in the past few decades, especially for us lucky enough to be born into lives where resources aren’t as scarce. There were a lot more dangers facing our ancestors. Whether it was starvation, predators, or other people, they had to listen to fear in order to survive. That’s where the classic fear responses came in. By now most people know that there are three or four of these responses based on who you ask. Flight, fight, freeze, or fawn. These all serve their purpose when facing real threats to physical or psychological safety. The issue is that we can’t use them to overcome our more modern fears. The fear that comes from modern anxiety has to do with perceptions of self and lack of confidence. We’re afraid to go after things we want because we think we can’t do them, we can’t control what happens, or that the outcome won’t be ideal. In the past, there wasn’t time to worry about things like this. A danger would appear, trigger the fear and then we’d overcome it and move on to the next. This goes for other parts of the world today as well. A fear of public speaking isn’t the same thing, it doesn’t just go away. It’s not actually out in the world, it’s constantly with you. There also wasn’t the internet and media that would reinforce all types of fears and self-doubt. All we had was life itself and we lived it. Now we’re constantly comparing ourselves to everything we read and see. We have all of these competing sources of information that we internalize. Society has created new types of social dangers and fears that constantly live with us. Our brain hasn’t caught up with society so it responds to these fears the same as it would to real danger.

When we respond to these modern fears with our old biology it can cause real issues. Fawn and Freeze are similar in that you get stuck either not moving or trying to appease the fear. You surrender to it and not in the Buddhist way. You roll over and believe this is just something you can’t overcome. While Flight is what I see as the most prevalent response among people. When someone feels that fear creeping in they decide to just bounce. The thought of even trying to face it is too much. It’s a lot easier to run from problems than it is to face them. Facing them is where Fight comes in and things get interesting. We all know what fight means in a classic context, if there’s a bear coming at you, you fight it and see who comes out alive. What does it mean in a more modern context though? You can’t fight the application for your dream job. You could try to fight the fear, but that’s a battle we often lose. The fear we’re talking about isn’t just something you can force into submission. It’s there because you’re invested in something. You care about this outcome and there’s anxiety fueling the fear around actually doing something to get it. That’s where embrace comes in. Embracing fear is what we used to do when we chose to fight danger head-on. We were scared but stood our ground. We had to use that energy to make sure that we came out the other side alive. While we can’t physically fight the things we’re scared of now (well most things), we can still choose to embrace that fear and then do what we need to do. We may still feel scared doing it but we’re doing it. That’s what confidence is. That’s what it means to be brave. This is the only way we can truly move forward. With the old types of danger, the other fear responses would pass after the danger was gone. You could run away from a bear, you could play dead, or you could try to appease an enemy. We can’t do that with our fear of public speaking, asking someone we like out, or pursuing our dream career. A bear eventually goes away, these things. They don’t because they get in the way of us living the life we want to live, again that’s why we’re anxious and scared in the first place.  

Living life is about embracing our fears and not letting them force us to run or hide. Our world is filled with uncertainty that sparks fear. If we only did things when we weren’t scared then we’d never move forward. No one is immune from fear either. The most confident person you know experiences it just as much as you do. They just learned to move forward anyways and carry it with them. What we’re scared of is often what we want the most. If that wasn’t the case then we wouldn’t be scared to face it. We’d just go through the motions and accept whatever happens. So by learning to be brave in those moments, we can get closer to living the life we want. I know this sounds like some toxic positivity bullshit. Every self-help guru says something like “Just face your fears”. I get that it’s hard and uncomfortable, but there’s a reason why they all say it. They know it resonates. You do too. Though what they don’t say is that it doesn’t happen overnight. You don’t just wake up one day able to just embrace your fear and do the thing you’re scared of. It takes time and it takes effort. Your fear may win a few rounds, but eventually, over time you will learn to overcome it. It will become softer, you’ll be able to see, embrace it, and then move forward. That’s what confidence really feels like. There will always be things we’re scared of but those are the things that help us grow and become the people we’re meant to be. Again this is more self-helpy than I typically like to be but this is some real shit that we can all use right now. Be brave friends and find your confidence.