“Without fear there cannot be courage.” ― Christopher Paolini

Fear has lot of power. Fear has the power to kill your ambitions, desires, dreams. We create excuses because of fear, that seems legitimate enough to not take any action and be in our comfort zone.

The issue is most of the time we don't even know that fear is driving our decision and is holding us back.

We give excuses like we don't have time, we don't have money, we don't know how to do it etc. However, in back of the mind their is fear running the show.

The biggest fear people deal with is fear of looking bad. All of us want to keep our image, reputation and listening in the outside world. We don't like people saying bad things about us. However, this notion of looking good or avoiding looking bad sabotages our growth and success.

How many times you don't do things because people might laugh at you? How many times you resist expressing yourself freely because people might judge you? Do you also stop yourself from taking a bold decision, because you are afraid of failure?

In all the above questions, the core fear is of people around us. Its not the action which is creating fear but the consequence of taking that action is triggering the fearful thoughts.

Here are 5 tips you can deal with the fear powerfully.

Tip 1: Know that fear is Natural Phenomenon

All of us are afraid or something or the other. Its just that some people are courageous enough to acknowledge their fear and some just hide it behind the curtains. If you are someone who at least accepts that you have certain fears, its good. Knowing is the first step to overcome or alter anything.

Tip 2: Whenever you feel afraid, think about what worst can happen

When we deal with the fear, we are actually afraid of consequences. Think about the worst case scenario. The moment you think about worst case scenario, your brain starts thinking about the solution to deal with it.

Tip 3: Shift your focus from Fear to Gratitude

Replace your fear with gratefulness. Tony Robbins says that ‘fear disappears whenever you are grateful’. You can’t feel fearful and grateful at the same time. It’s always one or the other.

So for example is you are afraid of driving a car, instead of focusing on fear, be grateful about you are willing to learn something which you don't know. This way, fear will disappear a lot quicker!

Tip 4: Zoom out

So when you feel fearful, you are fully zoomed in. If you zoom out and look at what will you think about this situation and its consequences, 1 year down the line or 10 years down the line, you will see there will not be any significance around it. How about if you do well and produce favorable results, how will your future look like? This will help you shift your focus from short term to long term.

Becoming fearless is not about fearing nothing — it’s about feeling the fear and doing it anyway.

Tip 5: Affirm the positive outcomes from your actions

To give you my example, I’m afraid that my friends will think my new YouTube channel is stupid and that they’ll ridicule me for it. But I know this says more about them than about me. I know this YouTube channel is going to be important for the success of my business. With the right consistency and practice I’ll get better — which leads to more viewers and subscribers.

In the worst case scenario, my YouTube channel won’t get off the ground. But even then I would have learned a great deal. I’d learn to be more comfortable in front of the camera and do better public speaking for example.

Also, I know I would regret it later on in my life if I didn’t try for (at least 6 months) to grow my YouTube channel. I won’t let this short-term fear lead to long-term regret.

Now Do It

Taking action is the most important step while dealing with fear. Most of the time we choose to be with the fear and accept it as our limitation. However, the only way to get out is take action.