Fear, Our Misunderstood Employee

Every time I feel motivated to write, and even when I have great ideas to write about, Fear appears out of thin air.

Fear that what I write will not be read.

Fear that my family and friends won’t be supportive of my choices.
Fear of losing friends and family.
Fear that my friends didn’t like me to begin with.
Fear of investing time in writing for nothing.
Fear of giving up writing.
Fear of failing in life.
Turns out, Fear is supposed to be there. Fear is a very real part of our brain that should be acknowledged for what it is and the real reason it’s there. Nothing more, nothing less.

Fear is our Health and Safety Director.

It’s the part of our brain that should be there to warn us of a real threat. If there’s a bear in the woods I’m walking in, that’s when I’d appreciate her presence because she will give me the ability to respond appropriately, i.e. giving me enough adrenaline to RUN AS FAST AS I CAN, to safety.

Fear is a valuable employee, DO NOT fire her.

The problem is sometimes (a lot of the time, who am I kidding?) too much power is given to Fear. She becomes obsessed with doing an amazing job, so she starts micromanaging areas of our lives that she should have nothing to do with.
When exploring your talent, for example, Fear should step back and only come in when there is a real threat – and warn, realistically, about the potential dangers (if there are any). Then, as a Health and Safety Director, her job is also to come up with potential solutions to said threats! The tricky bit for her is to know the difference between a real threat and a fake one.
She is right to tell us not to cross the road until the green man lights up. It is in her range of expertise to spot the threat of a moving vehicle. But it is not her job to put me off writing this very article, just because other people have written about Fear*. It is instead her job to report that there are few risks with writing, and it is MY job to continue working with other employees of my company, like Love.

We are supposed to let Fear interrupt us but only when the threat is real.

It was only a couple of years ago I realised I had to revise the role Fear would have in my life. Fear would tell me I was no good at my job, so I didn’t focus my energy on being as good as I could have been. Fear would warn me of a potential betrayal in the form of not being replied to, so I would decide NOT to message a friend. Fear would spring up like a puppet if I tried to step out of my comfort zone and ask for help, in case I was turned down. I was tired of Fear running my life.

I respectfully edited her job description and trained her to focus on the real dangers and potential threats. She still tries to overstep her boundaries but it’s up to me to manage her and tell her to concentrate on more realistic dangers. After all, I don’t live in the mountains where it’s possible that there will be a bear, but I still need her to remind me to hold on to the banister when walking up and down the stairs — I’m dead serious about this too, because I HAVE fallen down the stairs and fractured my tailbone. It’s so painful! I learned to listen to Fear and use the banister, albeit a bit late.

I have overcome my fear of writing because as long as I appreciate my own work and it brings me pleasure to write, that’s what is important.

I am the CEO of my body and it’s my job to lead all my employees, including Fear.

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Previously published on medium

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