Embrace The Fear: Do The Scary Thing

Is 2024 your year to get over certain fears?

The first step is setting the intention. Tell yourself: this is the year you are going to do it! This is the year you are going to do *something* to get over that fear.

It doesn’t have to be as big as a goal or a resolution, it’s simpler than that. It’s a small mindset shift to just acknowledge that “yes, this is the year that I’m going to do something about it.”

I used to be terrified of public speaking, and I didn’t get over it overnight. Looking back at it all, I wasn't actually scared of this one big scary thing, but all these smaller fears. Public speaking was terrifying cause it was the ultimate combination of several things that scared me:

I was scared of speaking in front of strangers.

I was scared of speaking in front of loads of people.

I was scared of messing up my talks.

I was scared of embarrassing myself.

I was scared of coming across as a fool.

I was scared of forgetting everything I wanted to say.

I was scared of saying the worst thing possible on stage.

There were lots of different things that scared me and stopped me from giving talks, and it seemed like I’d never be able to deal with it. Over time I discovered that if I understood exactly what my fears were, I could take smaller and easier steps to tackle each fear. There were different things that I could do to help my confidence and build experience to tackle each fear individually.

I knew that despite the fears, despite being scared of all these things, getting better at speaking would help me so much in my career and my life. I needed to embrace those fears and figure out how to deal with them, and do the scary things regardless of them.

You don’t have to do it alone. You don’t have to know where to start. Others can help you cause they’ve been through the same thing. The only thing that you need to do right now is tell yourself: I’m ready to do something about it.

The first step is purely acknowledging that fear and setting the intention that yes, this is the year you are going to do it! This is the year you are going to do *something* to get over your fears. You're going to do the scary thing.

You don’t have to know yet what you’re doing or how you’ll get there, but it’s a simple promise to yourself to be open to learning and challenging yourself. You can take a step this year to do it. You’ve got this.

So: who’s in? Who’s going to do something this year to get over a fear? Leave a comment behind if you’re embracing your fear and doing the scary thing!