What is Fear?
Fear is the state of feeling scared, regardless of whether you should be scared or not. Fear is part of a survival instinct to help us escape danger. When we experience fear, our adrenal glands release adrenaline into the blood stream which causes a series of biological reactions in our body. This is also known as the fight or flight response which enables us to escape from real danger.
However, this is only helpful when we are facing real physiological danger. About 99% of the fear people experience today are mental fear, such as fear of loss, fear of public speaking, fear of failure. This mental fear is what we are focusing here.
Why Overcome Fear?
There are four reasons why you should overcome fear.
1. Fear Holds You Back Firstly, mental fear paralyzes progress in you. It stops you from becoming the best person that you can be. Some people may say that it's okay - they like to be in a comfortable place where there is no fear. They like being in a state where there no danger, no threat, no anxiety. They are okay with not becoming their best self.
If that's the case, then why are you here for? Don't you want the best life you can ever live? Why settle for being lesser than you are when you can be so much more?
When you let yourself be driven by fear, you become condensed to a slave of fear. I have friends whose lives are centered around fear and it is very disabling. Fear is like our compass towards growth. Where we fear something, it means there is something you are uncertain about. This uncertainty represents an opportunity for you to learn and grow as an individual - to become even better than who you are now.
2. You Cannot Never Fully Escape From Fear Mental fear exists everywhere. As long as you run away instead of deal with it, it will always be there, taunting you in everything. That's because the problem isn't the situation you are in - the problem is your perception of reality and your inability to deal with fear. As long as you continue your current mode of thinking, you will never fully escape it. You can only try to run, but eventually you are going to find yourself backed into a dead end
When that happens, you either have to learn to deal with it, or cower in fear and become a fraction of the person you can be. Since you have to deal with it at a certain time, you might as well learn to overcome fear now, rather than waste all that effort escaping it only to deal with it anyway.
3. Fear Is A Waste of Your Energy Mental fear is illogical and a waste of emotional and mental energy.
By being fearful and thinking about what you fear, you are wasting your effort on something that does not move you forward. Some may say this fear is what triggers them to move the situation forward. While there have been times where fear seems to push people forward, a more accurate summation will be people moving forward in spite of the fear that is present. Fear leads to a rush of adrenaline that gives you increased physical performance, not increased mental performance. You can think about answers just as well, if not better, without all the adrenaline that's pumping through your body. Having more adrenaline for prolonged periods of time strains yourself and gives you jittery nerves instead. Think about how much more you can do if you do not have to spend your energy counteracting that fear.
Also remember that for every moment you spend being fearful, you lose that moment for positive thoughts and feelings, which can bloom into a wealth of positive aftereffects.
4. Fear Is Your Mind Having mental fear is like being scared of a scarecrow - it looks scary and seems scary, but it's actually harmless. Mental fear is based on danger made up in your mind. This fear arises because your brain somehow formulated a perception these non-physical dangers are real dangers - when they are not. For example, public speaking. Public speaking is a top fear among people - even more so than dying or illnesses. Why are people afraid of public speaking? Realistically, speaking publicly does not result in real danger.
Some people will point out that it's the thought of making mistakes, being judged, embarrassment that is scary. But these fears are all in your mind. None of them has occurred yet. Even if it has happened before, it does not mean that this is going to happen now. You are in the present and the future has not occurred yet. You are in the place to mold you're future into whatever outcome you desire.
Face Your Fear What fears are you stifling yourself with? Start to face your fear as you become your highest self.