How to Embrace Fear (for more carefree living)
Learning how to embrace fear and change is a skill to be strengthened. Because it’s not that things get easier — they objectively stay the same — it's just that you get stronger.
So consider this guide a workout plan, a template to borrow. Because on the other side of fear is growth.
This is how I personally approach things. It’s what I do to continue strengthening this skill.
Let’s get to it.
Table of Contents Show
What Causes Fear? (examples + reasons)
What is fear exactly? And why do we have it?
This is a big topic, but scratching the surface a bit will give us some helpful insights.
Fear is a negative emotion caused by some perceived threat or danger. It has an evolutionary component (for detecting threats and survival) but can be caused by things like:
Genetics
Past experiences
Trauma
Stress
Fear can show up in many ways — from an increased heart rate, dizziness and trembling to simply having butterflies in your stomach.
Whatever the symptoms or cause, everyone experiences it in some way or another.
Here are some examples (that I’ve personally dealt with):
Putting yourself out there (e.g. sharing content or creative vulnerability)
Live performances (e.g. playing music in front of people)
Starting your dream business
Rejection or looking stupid
Spooky movies
Fear is normal and change is inevitable. So learning how to embrace these things is a path worth pursuing.
With that said, let’s move on to the next section.
How I Embrace Fear + Change (5 steps)
Fear and change can be uncomfortable, but let’s not let them stop us.
The steps below are how I personally handle things. I hope they help you too.
1. First Define Your Fears
Sometimes, we may not even know exactly why we’re experiencing fear.
So it helps to get some clarity. After all, we can’t work on what we don’t know exists.
Here are some tips for getting clear on things:
Pay attention to (and track) emotional and physical cues
Think about your dreams or goals and what holds you back from pursuing them
Challenge your comfort zones and find your threshold
Write it out by journaling
Practice self reflection (I personally love meditation)
2. Break Down Each Fear (+ its causes)
Once you’ve isolated some specific fears you’d like to address, it’s time to dissect them.
I love breaking things down to better understand them. This is first principles thinking and we can use it here.
For example, I have a fear of playing music live in front of people. It gives me anxiety.
So to “solve” this fear, I should start by understanding it more.
I should identify its cause and analyze why I’m afraid of it.
Turns out, I’m mostly afraid of sounding bad, looking stupid or making mistakes.
I’m afraid of having a botched performance — this is a super common anxiety for performing artists.
But once I know exactly why I have the fear, I can work toward addressing each point.
3. Take Small Steps Everyday
Taking small steps adds up.
So let’s start chipping away at our fears and their causes. To illustrate how I do this, let’s go back to my example on playing live music.
I have a fear of playing music live because I don’t want to look stupid or sound bad on stage.
So to address this, I started taking small, micro actions everyday.
I started practicing singing daily and actually worked on finishing my songs to improve my performance skills.
Then I started posting videos of me playing guitar on Instagram (just my hands in the beginning).
Now I post daily videos of me playing guitar and singing live on social media for the world to see.
(even though only a few people actually watch — but if that’s you, thank you and I love you!).
But the point is this, I’m now extremely comfortable playing and singing online (but it used to make me weak at the knees).
That’s the power of taking micro actions and pushing your comfort zone little by little.
So what’s next for me? Well, playing live shows.
(so stay tuned…)
4. Stack the Cards
Whatever we’re doing, we’ll eventually run into a few walls or obstacles.
This is normal, but we can minimize their effect by stacking the deck in our favor.
Whether it’s motivation issues, confidence woes or a lack of support, there’s bound to be a few bumps along the way.
So I like to stack the cards in three ways:
My inner circle
The people I spend the most time with
My outer circle
The type of content I consume the most
My environment
The place(s) I spend the most time in
The goal is to optimize all (or at least some) of these points in our favor.
For me (and my music example), that means hanging around more fellow musicians, consuming more motivational content and being in places that inspire me to do and be better.
It’s all about controlling the things you have control over (like the type of videos you choose to watch or the people you spend your time with).
5. Focus On Habit Formation
Once we know our fear, what’s causing it and the small steps we need to take to address it, it’s time to focus on habit building.
The ultimate goal is to become so familiar and consistent with change and taking micro steps towards your fears that you hardly notice the actions anymore.
It’s just a subconscious part of your routine and life.
You’re so familiar with tackling your fears that it’ll feel like second nature, and your fear emotions become quieter and quieter.
And trust me, you’ll get there if you simply show up for yourself, day in and day out.
(but you know, take a break sometimes too)
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