What better time to write about fear than Halloween night? All the fear on Halloween isn't really scary at all: corn syrup blood; rubber monsters; shrieks with giggles at the end. It's the night to make fun of our fear.
But in real life, fear is no joke. Fear is powerful. In the best case, it can be a life-saving reaction to true threat: we're all fortunate to have been born with this response built in to us. The problem is, even though we are not now being pursued by large predators or attacked by rival clansmen on a daily basis, we still often react as though we were.
In this modern age, our fear can become chronic - a daily impediment to living the lives we want and are capable of living. And our day-to-day fears are often directed at things that pose no actual danger to us. For example, about 75% of adults have a profound fear of speaking in public. For many, it is their deepest fear. What, exactly, are we afraid of here? Speaking in public won't kill us; it won't even hurt us. At worst, we might look foolish or incompetent. And yet, millions of people say they're more afraid of speaking in public than they are of dying. (Jerry Seinfeld famously joked about this statistic by noting that the average person at a funeral would rather be in the coffin than delivering the eulogy).
At least with public speaking, folks generally know they're afraid. The most insidious fears are those of which we're not aware. For example, a number of years ago I coached an executive who was deeply unhappy in her job. Her boss, the CEO, was a really bad guy (arrogant, short-sighted, mean-spirited, and not very smart), and she had much less autonomy and influence than she deserved, given her skills and experience. I worked with her to create an exit strategy, and she developed a clear and feasible plan for herself, complete with actions and timelines. Yet when I met with her again to check on her progress, she hadn't done any of the things she'd committed to only a month earlier.
I asked her why, and she offered a flurry of excuses - too busy, couldn't get hold of the people on her list, no jobs in her field, dog ate my homework, etc. etc. I asked her what she could have done differently to overcome those obstacles, and she said - in effect - that they were all totally out of her control. I sat back, puzzled. Then I decided to just reflect back to her what I was seeing and hearing.
"So," I said, "You're completely stuck. You really have no way of leaving your current job." She stared at me for moment, speechless -- and then burst into tears.
After she had composed herself, she said she had just realized that she wasn't making effort because she was, quite simply, afraid.
We then had a very honest conversation about what was scary for her: she hadn't looked for a job in over a decade and worried about interviewing badly; her boss' constant criticism had made her question her competence; she was concerned her husband might not support her decision. Once we had surfaced those specific fears, we talked about how she could move through them. It was slow going, but once she recognized her fears, she was able to address them. At that point, she was free to work her plan. About eight months later she found a new job, reporting to someone she liked and respected and doing challenging work for which she was both appreciated and compensated.
What are you afraid of? One way to find out: look at risks you say you want to take in your life but don't. For instance, do you talk about wanting to learn to sing, but don't take lessons, citing busyness as the obstacle? Do you bemoan the fact that you're single, but find reasons to avoid every situation where you might meet someone new? Do you, like my client, complain constantly about your current job, but don't take steps to change it? If you want to free yourself from the limiting effects of fear, try this:
Acknowledge it: My client's breakthrough came when she realized that her reasons were just excuses. Take a look at the thing you're not doing and listen, for a moment, to your internal monologue, your justifications for not doing it. Imagine, for a moment, that you're a neutral third party listening to you. What would that person think? It would probably be pretty clear to that person that you're avoiding looking at the real reason for your inaction. Once you can say to yourself, "I'm afraid of this," you're halfway to being free of that fear.
Ask: What's the worst? Once you've spoken your fear, ask yourself, What's the very worst thing that could happen if I do this? Really let yourself go all the way down the path, to the worst possible outcome. For instance, "If I leave this job, I might never get another. I could become homeless, go crazy and die of starvation and exposure." Then ask, How likely is this to happen? Be as objective as possible in your answer. Odds are, an objective answer would be some version of, "it's extremely unlikely." Just getting to this point in the process will quite often make you feel much less afraid and resistant; it's like turning on the light when you're a kid, afraid in the dark: Oh look, that monster is just my shirt hung over the chair.
Address it. Then ask, What can I do to make it even less likely that the worst will happen? This is where your brain starts to engage in practical problem-solving (which in itself is a wonderful antidote to fear). In the example above, you might decide not to leave your job till you have another one lined up; or not to leave till you have six months of living expenses saved, and a part-time job arranged to fall back on if you need it. Whatever will make you feel as though you're reducing 'the worst' to a vanishingly small possibility.
Act. Finally, take one small step: anything will do. Update your resume. Put your profile on Monster.com. Have lunch with someone whose company is hiring. Doing a simple action that pushes up against your fear, and finding that nothing bad happens as a result can be liberating out of all proportion to the import of the act itself. You'll find the next step is much easier; and the next.
In fact, you might come to find that you have far more courage and boldness in you than you thought possible, and that Halloween is a night to thumb your nose at fear and celebrate the fact that it's losing its hold over you.
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Check out Erika Andersen’s latest book, Leading So People Will Follow, and discover how to be a followable leader. Booklist called it “a book to read more than once and to consult many times.”
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