Overcoming Fear

• Face your fears and they will have less power over you.
• Fear will control your life. But only if you let it!
• Don’t fear failure. Learn from it instead!

In the previous article you found out about how everyone has a unique blueprint, that individually qualifies them for some form of greatness.

Despite the supposed limitations a person may appear to have, by examining who they are and what they are capable of, any person who so desires may become extremely successful in life.

This success is defined solely by your unique blueprint, which means no one else can achieve exactly the same success as you, in exactly the same way.

You also found out that despite everyone having the potential to achieve greatness, not everyone does. One of the main reasons given for this was the debilitating and restrictive affects of fear.

I even went so far as to call fear the “greatest enemy of all human potential”, because it inhibits a person from fully realising and acting upon their unique blueprint.

In this article we are going to start looking at ways of confronting the fears that limit your true potential, and later, we shall explore some specific strategies for dealing with, controlling and overcoming fear.

So let’s now begin by quickly recapping the different types of fear: external, internal and subconscious. Try to think which category the fears you are trying to overcome fit into.

External Fear

An external fear is like a phobia. It is something outside of you that causes you some degree of internal pain, discomfort or anxiety when you are confronted with it.

Examples could include a fear of flying, a fear of heights or a fear of spiders.

Internal Fear

Internal fears can be generalized as a form of low self esteem. They are triggered by external factors that create internal feelings of self doubt, whereby you feel incapable of doing or achieving something and so don’t even try to do it, or do so half heartedly, with the expectation of failure.

For example, you want to apply for a new job, start your own business or ask someone out on a date, but you doubt your own ability to complete the task successfully.

Subconscious Fear

Subconscious fears are deeply engrained limiting beliefs that have been accepted into the subconscious, and typically manifest themselves as negative self talk and self sabotage. They are closely linked and inter-related with internal fears.

Examples of subconscious fears could include a fear of success, a fear of failure or a fear of happiness.

What Are Your Fears?

When it comes to categorising fears, the most common fear groups tend to be either external fears or internal combined with subconscious fears.

However it is important to understand that whilst you may be able to categorise your fears into one group or another, in reality people generally have many layered fears of different intensities.

The most dominant fear tends to mask the less dominant fears, until the dominant fear has been overcome.

This then causes the less dominant fear to rise to the surface and become more noticeable. This process will repeat itself until all your fears have been overcome.

Therefore to successfully overcome all your fears you need to be willing to take a multi layered approach, whereby you sequentially tackle each fear that appears to be negatively impacting your life.

So right now decide upon what your dominant fear is. Think which fear is having the biggest negative impact on your life? This is the fear that you should work on overcoming first.

The Fear Scale

Once you have decided upon your most dominant fear, give yourself a “fear score” of 1-10, whereby 10 is maximum fear and 1 is no fear. This is your starting point, and what you will be working on lowering to an acceptable level.

However it is important to point out that to begin with you should not necessarily expect to reduce all fears to a level 1 (no fear) immediately. It is far better to aim to reduce a fear to a moderate level.

For example, if you start out at a level 10, then you should aim to reduce you fear to a level 5, whereby you are able to control your own  thoughts and actions in response to a fearful situation, rather than letting that fear control you.

This form of fear management will have the most impact on your life, because even though you are not initially removing the fear completely, you are removing the restrictive impact it is having on your life.

So bear that in mind, and do not become discouraged if you still feel fearful around whatever it is you are trying to overcome. Initially what you are trying to do is to reduce and control your fear, rather than completely overcome it.

The added benefit of this approach is that once you do manage to reduce your fear to an acceptable level, it will become far easier to eliminate it completely.

Making The “Magnetic Flip”

Fear causes a natural reaction within us that strongly motivates us to avoid something. When we fear something we want to run away, hide or do whatever it takes to not experience it.

This could involve traveling by car to avoid the anxiety caused by flying, or not asking someone out on a date to avoid the risk of rejection and looking foolish.

Whatever fear you have you need to recognise that right now you and whatever it is you fear, are negatively repelling each other. It’s like trying to put two south facing magnets together.

No matter how hard you try you can’t get them to stick together, and the moment you let go of them, they will quickly shoot apart.

This therefore is the first and hardest barrier you must overcome, and in order to do so, you must flip one of the magnets over so that north will attract to south.

This “magnetic flip” is achieved by your desire to overcome a fear. However in order for this flip to be successful, you must strongly desire and believe in your ability to overcome your fear.

If your desire is weak, and your belief in yourself wavers, then you will be unable to flip the magnet and you will always be repelled from the thing you fear.

Give Yourself A Reason To Overcome Your Fear

Before continuing with these articles, ensure that you strongly desire to overcome whatever it is you fear.

One of the best ways to do this is to write your fear down, and then list all the ways it is negatively impacting your life.

Think how this fear is affecting you from achieving the greatness your unique blueprint has set out for you?

Then make a list of how your life will be positively impacted once this fear is removed, or reduced to an acceptable level.

Keep this list for future reference, you will be needing it in the fear sessions described later on.

Once you have thought this through, and your desire is strong, then congratulate yourself! You have just flipped the magnet and moved yourself down a level on the fear scale!

Confronting Your Fear

In order to overcome your fear, you must be willing to face your fear and to expose yourself to it. But remember, at this early stage there will still be quite a strong repulsion to the thing you fear. This is normal and to be expected.

Your goal now is to start increasing the level of magnetic attraction between you and the thing you fear, whilst at the same time, learning to reduce and manage the fear you feel.

Because there are so many different types and intensities of fear, it is impossible for me to specifically address each and every one.

However what I can do, is give you some general guidelines. In this, and the following articles, you will learn about some specific strategies you can use to overcome the restrictive impact fear is having on your  life.

But ultimately it will be up to you, and only you, to overcome your fear. People can help and guide you, but no one can control the way you feel except yourself.

Controlling The Biology Of Fear

The following techniques will train your body to react in an appropriate way around the thing you fear. And that is what overcoming fear is all about.

When you reduce or eliminate your fear, your body will remain calm when you are exposed to something you dislike and would rather avoid.

But this can only be done through repeated exposure, and a process of desensitisation.

The reason for this is because when you are scared of something, it is an automatic reaction. It is not something you try to feel, it just happens automatically in response to something.

Why you feel scared is because the body thinks that you are in danger, and so alerts you to the perceived danger by making you notice it and become fully aware of it.

Your body then continues this reaction by increasing your heart rate, breathing and pumping blood into your muscles, so that you can quickly run away or defend yourself.

This is an inbuilt survival mechanism that is hard wired into your DNA, and which is why it occurs without you even thinking about it.

This survival mechanism is called the “fight or flight” response, and is designed to keep you alive in the face of danger.

The fear you currently have is inappropriately triggering this mechanism, because you have somehow linked the thing you fear to a pain of some kind.

So whenever you are presented with it, your survival mechanism kicks in because it thinks it needs to protect you from a danger.

By using the following techniques you will rewire the connections in your brain, so that you do not trigger this mechanism.

However the fight or flight response does not just switch itself off immediately, rather it fades gradually through a process of desensitisation.

Which means it “learns” over time, and with experience, that something is definitely not a threat. So don’t expect your fear to dissappear immediately!

Understanding The Desensitisation Process

Suppose as you are reading this article, someone quickly runs up behind you and shouts BOO! Your natural reaction to this would most likely be to jump and be startled.

A few minutes later as you are reading another article, that same person comes up and shouts BOO again! This time you still jump, but weren’t quite as startled as you were the first time.

After getting quite annoyed at this person, you turn around and start reading some more articles. Just as you find something that looks really interesting, you hear “BOO” again!

But this time you don’t jump. Why? Because you have been desensitised to the BOO, and so it no longer has the same affect on you.

What occurred in this example was your body reacting in an appropriate way, to something it perceived as a threat towards your safety. As a result your body strongly alerted you to the first BOO.

The second time you heard the BOO you still jumped, because you have not yet learnt to fully classify that BOO as having no threat to you (harmless).

Although because you were not harmed by the boo before, the shock you experienced was less and your recovery from that shock was quicker.

The third time you heard the BOO, you knew it wasn’t anything that could hurt you. It was just someone trying to scare you.

As a result your body learnt that it does not need to ready itself to escape a danger, and so you didn’t jump or even look around.

This simple example shows you the basic principle of desensitisation, and by using the following techniques, you will learn how to teach your body to react appropriately in response to a fearful situation. This is why in order to overcome your fears, you must face them.

So let’s now begin by looking at two techniques that are used to confront fear: Immediate Exposure and Gradual Exposure.

Immediate Fear Exposure

The immediate exposure technique is perhaps the most brutal and anxiety producing way of overcoming a fear. Do not expect any mercy with this technique, it is harsh!

As the name suggests, this technique involves exposing yourself to the thing you fear immediately and at a high intensity.

For an external fear, such as a fear of spiders, this would involve holding a spider in your hand, or letting it crawl all over your body.

For an internal fear, such as a fear of asking women out on a date, this would involve going up to as many women as possible with the aim of meeting them again at some point in the future.

As you can imagine, this technique tends to cause lots of immediate anxiety and panic, as you are being put close to something you strongly repel. The natural reaction to the emotions you experience, are to get away as soon as possible.

The reason why this technique is so brutal is not because of the immediate discomfort it causes, but because for this technique to be effective, it must be performed repeatedly.

This technique is effective because by repeatedly exposing yourself to something you fear, you desensitise yourself to it by teaching your body that it possess no real threat.

After repeated exposures the fight or flight response will gradual decrease, until it is no longer activated when you are confronted with the previously fear situation.

Advantages And Disadvantages Of Immediate Exposure

One of the main advantages of using the immediate exposure technique, is that people tend to overcome their fears far more rapidly than using other techniques. Typically about 5-10 exposures are sufficient to produce very noticeable results.

Another advantage is that because you are thrown immediately into the deep end, you have less time to worry or think about your fear, which can often make things appear much worse than they actually are.

However it is important to understand that there is a risk when using this technique, especially if you are doing it alone and without anyone to support you.

If during an immediate exposure you have a bad experience, then this could amplify your original fear and make it worse.

Although if you have someone there with you at the time, you should feel more at ease both before, during and after the experience, which will minimise this risk.

Gradual Fear Exposure

The gradual exposure technique is the complete opposite to the immediate exposure technique. Although it works in the same way, by desensitizing the fight or flight response.

Instead of exposing yourself immediately to the thing you fear, with this technique you gradually expose yourself to it in a series of small steps.

This method tends to be favored by psychologists who help people overcome their fears, because it is a much more gentle and relaxed approach.

The patient can do what they are comfortable with, and with some help and motivation from the psychologist, will eventually overcome their fear.

However the disadvantage of using this technique is that is that it often takes a lot more time for the fear to be overcome.

Also if you are trying to do this by yourself and have no one to motivate you, you are unlikely to push yourself forward enough for any real progress to be made.

Another disadvantage is that because you are taking your time with the exposure, you also have lots of time to worry! Which again, can make things worse.

The trick when using this technique is to continually push yourself to a level where you feel uncomfortable, but are still able to control yourself and stand your ground.

So for an example, lets take someone with an extreme fear of spiders. Whereas the immediate exposure technique would require for them to immediately hold a spider, a gradual exposure technique would first involve them just thinking about spiders or looking at pictures of spiders.

They would then be placed in the same room as a spider, and over a series of sessions move closer to it, until they feel comfortable standing right next to it.

The next steps would involve moving their hand closer to the spider, but doing so in their own time, and to the level they are comfortable with.

This process would be repeated until they are eventually able to hold the spider for longer and longer periods.

Which Fear Technique Should I Use?

The most common method of overcoming fear is the gradual exposure technique. Simply because it is easier to do, and less anxiety producing.

The immediate exposure technique is used far less frequently, and when it is used, tends to occur by accident.

For example, you fall into a well, break your leg and can’t move. It just so happens that you have a fear of rats, and this well is full of them!

After lots of screaming, you will eventually calm down and learn to deal with the rats until you get out. From this experience you will likely overcome your fear of rats.

But there is also the danger that this immediate exposure could leave you severely traumatized, thereby making your fear of rats even worse.

Special Note For Subconscious Fears

Both of the exposure techniques described above can also be used to overcome subconscious fears, because both have the potential to disprove certain beliefs the subconscious regards as true.

Although generally speaking, the exposure techniques tend to be most effective for internal and external fears because they rewire the brain, and reduce or eliminate, the inappropriate fight or flight response.

Because subconscious fears are deeply ingrained subconscious beliefs, they may require additional effort for them to be fully reprogrammed.

The following article on overcoming self sabotage will give you more detailed information on this.

What Is Self Sabotage?

Additional Information On Overcoming Fear

As I said at the start of this article, in order to overcome your fears, you and you alone, must face them. 

There is no getting round this fact, and you must therefore be prepared and willing to experience some form of anxiety, as you start the process of overcoming your fear.

No one is saying this will be easy, but if you follow any of the techniques listed above, and some of the others in the next few articles, you will at some point in the future overcome the fear you currently have.

This is what you should keep in mind to motivate you. The day you will be set free from the restrictions that fear is having on your life. The day you start achieving the greatness set out by your unique blueprint.

There will be times when you feel like giving in, but just remember this is a natural reaction. You have to keep going until your body and mind learn that it is reacting inappropriately. So be patient but firm with it, and let it know whose the boss!

Getting By With A Little Help From Your Friends

Because fear can be so hard to overcome alone, one of the best things you can do is to ask a close friend to help you overcome your fear.

Do your fear sessions together, and ask them to keep pushing you forward to a level where you are uncomfortable, but can still stand your ground.

With their help and motivation you will keep yourself moving forward, and gradually reduce the fear you feel.

To monitor your progress keep a journal of all your sessions, including what you did, how you reacted and the level of fear experienced at each session.

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