I read an interesting article on Ryan Paugh’s blog Employee Evolution all about fear and how to manage it..

I agree with pretty much everything Ryan says, but want to make 2 really important distinctions.

1. I have a bone to pick with Marie Curie, specifically this quotation of hers – “Nothing in life is to be feared. It is only to be understood.” How wonderfully simplistic and how far off the mark can one world-famous scientist be?

   There are things in life to be feared, and to think otherwise means you really need to take off those rose-coloured glasses or get out from under the duvet you’ve been hiding under.

   I’m sure it’s not just me, but I’d be scared witless if someone mugged me in the street. I’d pee myself with fear if robbers burst in through my window in the middle of the night. Fear is a part of life, but that doesn’t mean that it has to limit what you do and how you do it. I still walk down the street and I haven’t boarded up my bedroom window.

   As for the “understanding” that Marie Curie alluded to, can you imagine how annoying and dull it would be to try and understand everything in your life? I don’t pretend to understand everything, and there are many things in my life that have question marks over them. Why did I let Liz Bennett go in preference for hanging out with my friends when I was a teenager? Why didn’t I spot how toxic my job in e-Business was before the real damage was done? Why didn’t the BBC schedule Seinfeld in a better slot?

   All good questions on the face of it, but understanding the reasons why some things happen is just pointless. You could spend your whole life trying to understand something, which is why some people spend a lifetime in therapy – because there will always be more ‘stuff’ to dig up and try to understand.

   You don’t need to understand things, you just need to acknowledge them. Real acceptance is the key, and that takes courage and an implicit trust in who you are. You need to trust that you’re okay and that you’ll be just fine, then you can reach a point of acceptance. And yes, that’s real confidence…

   Gail Caissy has it right in Ryan’s article: “Many of the changes in our lives, our society and environment are beyond our control. When change comes into our lives and there is nothing we can do about it, we have to accept it and learn to live with it.” Reinhold Niebuhr’s famous Serenity Prayer sums it up nicely, and Marcus Aurelius had something pretty cool to say about it too.

2. “Fear is a product of your imagination.” says Ryan, but I have to disagree. Fear and doubt aren’t simply a product of your imagination and they can be incredibly useful, as long as you know how to use them and don’t allow your Gremlin to use them for its own ends. I’ll explain.
   
   Your Gremlin is that part of you that will use every dirty trick it knows to keep you away from challenge, risk and opportunity, for the simple reason that where you are right now is a known quantity and that’s where your Gremlin feels safest. Your Gremlin will say things that are deliberately intended to undermine your confidence and ability, so that you keep away from what might be risky or hold yourself back from doing something that might not work out or make you look silly.

   This can manifest in your career, but it often manifests more in your social or romantic life, because that’s where you’re not entirely in control.

   If you let it, your Gremlin will use your fears and doubts to extrapolate conclusions about the risk or challenge you’re facing and use them as evidence to keep you away from change. “Don’t do that,” it’ll say to you, “just look at what could happen.” Worse still, your Gremlin will take over your thinking and make your fears real. You’ll stumble, your mind will fix on every small mistake and you’ll forget just how capable you are. “Look, see what I told you? You’re not up to this and probably never will be.”

   Remember that your fears and doubts are perfectly valid in themselves; it’s only when your Gremlin gets hold of them that they can turn into something imaginary and limiting.

   That’s why you need to teach yourself how to spot the intention behind what you tell yourself and train yourself to interrupt your Gremlin when you start to hear it. As Dr Don Greene, Performance Coach and author of Fight Your Fear and Win says, “Silence the sabotaging voice and tap into the talent and training your brain is ready to unleash. It’s a matter of getting control of your stress response so that it’s not involuntary.”

   Remember – statements that are specifically designed to hold you back are coming from your Gremlin. Statements that are designed to make you think about what you’re doing, make you ask the right questions, find the best answers and make you ready for what happens next are coming from your doubts. There’s a world of difference between the two.