Selfalot

Daily Quote: “Too many people are thinking of security instead of opportunity. They seem to be more afraid of life than death.” James F. Bymes

If a fear is so overpowering that it paralyses you then scale down your risk. Whatever it is that is creating such fear in your mind, chop it down to smaller steps. You want to set yourself tasks that you can manage. That does not mean that all fear will disappear, but it will mean that you will be able to overcome the smaller fears.

Reducing your tasks that are so frightening works hand in hand with your goal setting. When identifying your goals you will also want to ensure that you have set them down to be manageable. That is you have identified the many small steps you need to take in order to reach those goals.

If your goals are too large and the work required to achieve them too much, you will not have the courage to even start them. This is a mistake often made by people. They wish for themselves huge improvements in their lives and hope to achieve these in no time at all.

For instance if you have been putting on weight over many years, at small amounts, you will not be able to get rid of this weight within a few short months. If you do think that is what you wish to do then attending such excellent programs as Weight Watchers offers will not be the right move for you. You will be afraid of every meeting because your expectations of what you wish to achieve will create fear in your mind that you will have failed.

What about trying out for a promotion? You are afraid of the job interview. In fact you are so scared you cannot even submit your CV in the first instance. In this way you kill off any chance you might have had of getting this promotion. After all if you have not applied, then you can’t fail at it.

There are many ways of overcoming your fear of interviews. You may wish to attend a course in public speaking such as offered by Toast Masters. There is also the option of hiring a professional coach to help you become more confident and to role play interviews with you and in general help you present yourself in a favourable light.

You might wish to attend a sales course. After all a job interview is all about selling yourself. There are many ways to create small steps and processes towards a larger goal that will make it much easier to cope with a fearful situation.

Remember when you learnt how to drive a car or ride a bicycle. Your driving instructor taught you in small manageable steps how to drive. You did your circles around the parking lot not having to face the stressful situation of rush hour traffic.

Or when riding your bike you had an adult holding the seat so that you had support. Then they took their hand off for a bit and grabbed hold again when you wobbled too much. This process carried on until you felt confident and skilled enough to ride on your own.

Break down your fears in the same manner. Reduce your risk. Create smaller bite size challenges so that you can manage them. Get help so that you can lean on someone when you feel that it’s getting too much for you.

Cutting down your risks in this manner will make it much easier for you to cope with your fear than if you take on a huge challenges where your fear could overwhelm you.