The Fearful Mindset: Breaking Free and Embracing Fear as a Catalyst

[00:00:00] Fear can save your life, but it can also limit it. It would help if you saw it as an emotion rather than something that controls what you think and what you do. Helen Keller lost her sense of sight and hearing when she was just 19 months old. Her speech stopped developing. Nevertheless, she became an educator.

It was a talented writer and speaker with more excuses than most people for giving in to their fears and living a limited life. She didn't do that. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. The fearful are caught as often as the bold. That's what Helen Keller had to say about handling fear.

You have to find a middle ground between unsafe ignorance and total avoidance. That's because if you don't, you might be placing the following limits on your life. In this episode, we'll look at fear and how changing your attitude about it can absolutely change your life.

Here's the million dollar question. How do men like us reach our [00:01:00] full potentials, grow into the men we dream of being, while taking care of our responsibilities, working, being good husbands, fathers, and still take care of ourselves? Well, that's the big question. In this podcast, we'll help you answer those questions and more.

My name is Brent and welcome to the Fallible Man Podcast.

Hey, what's up? My name is Brent and welcome to podcast. Your home for all things, man. A big shout out to Fallible Nation. That's our private community. There's more information about that below in the description. A warm welcome to our first time listeners. Hey, thanks for checking out, checking us out. We'd love to hear your feedback, get an idea of what you think of it, and I hope you enjoy the show.

So fear limits your options. Fearful thoughts want you to act right away. For some reason you sense danger alarm bells are going off and you have a strong urge to act immediately in some way. That's not always the smartest option. Maybe the housing [00:02:00] market is starting to slump. Your house is up for sale and you're not getting the offers you had hoped for TV stations and internet aren't helping these days.

They thrive on fear. And you continually hear that you can lose a lot of money. If you don't sell your house now, when your input is negative, your fear can be. Can build to the point that you accept a very low offer on your house when the best option would have just been waiting a couple more months for the market to stabilize.

This is why it's often smart to remove yourself from whatever is causing you fearful thoughts. Look at your situation from another angle and keep your option open. It only focuses on the downside fear. It only focuses on the downside of things. Some people see it as a positive possible outcome when fear strikes.

I know that sounds weird, right? They train themselves to understand that while fear can be very helpful, its focus is negative. When people give in to fear, they embrace the idea that nothing positive can happen. [00:03:00] This might occur because of some previous experience, which is why many fears develop. You were given a project to work, and it's a solo gig.

You'll receive no help. The situation hasn't treated you too well in the past, and so you start to get anxious and see nothing but failure on the horizon. The glass is half empty, as in classic pessimistic views. I've certainly been there. I'm probably guessing you have too. Stick with that mindset and you may create a self fulfilling prophecy.

All of your fearful thoughts having you stress out and they'll affect your performance. You end up failing reinforcing your fear that nothing good can happen in this situation. Fear prevents you from growing. Talked about it, your ego earlier, right? This part of your psyche always wants to think great thoughts about who you are.

Another one of his important jobs is to keep you living. It teams up with fear to tell you that your creative reality is fine and you don't need anything more. Fear then takes it a [00:04:00] step further and you begin convincing yourself that if you try and grow or expand in any way, bad things will happen, right?

Homeostasis. Your survival instinct gets into the act and paints terrible what if pictures. And you start to consider what will happen if you change your current situation. You have all this input telling you that you simply should just exist in the good moment, right? That's, that's enough. You don't need to go farther.

And that makes it difficult for you to realize your dreams or achieve your goals. Fear keeps you from changing your situation as it is now. It constricts you, it holds you down rather than helping you build so you can live your life and live the life you deserve. Fear is also the opposite of intuition.

Some of the greatest human successes came about because someone followed their gut instinct. Call it intuition, call it acting on a hunch, whatever you want to term it as. Got gut feeling, right? Fear doesn't like you listening to the silent voice that science has proved can be very good at helping you create the best possible outcome.

You're [00:05:00] smarter than you realize and your psyche and your sight, your brain knows it, even if you aren't tapped into it. Psychology Today published a blog post titled the science of intuition back in October 21. And in it, neuroscientist Antonio Damasio says that our bodies constantly process incoming information process.

incoming information, and sometimes we're unaware of this. These unseen clues about how we should act in any given situation try to get our attention as instinct or intuition. It's those nagging thoughts you should act in a particular way. Regardless of what you see or hear going around you, intuition often seems to disregard common sense.

This is because something other than your five basic senses has received and processed the information. Fear tells you you are absolutely absurd if you believe any of these feelings, even though your best outcome can only be realized if you trust your instincts. Fear can also lead you to indecision.

Sometimes not acting is the best action to take. That's not always the case, though. [00:06:00] You can probably think of times when indecision persisted to the point that a good opportunity just passed you by. Time was spent wondering whether you should get involved, whether you missed out on improving your life.

Ancient wisdom tells us that if we don't decide where we are headed, somebody else will. People or events will step in and take action when we don't. Would you rather have luck or the fickle finger of fate, choosing what will happen in your life? Or do you prefer to actually have control? Fear can lead that indecision and that means taking no action.

You just let your life keep passing you by rather than consciously acting. When you decide what path to take, you at least give yourself a chance to create a desired outcome. If you choose instead to be indecisive, you lose control and that's not where you want to be, right? Fear actually can lead to health problems.

Chronic fear over time leads to mental and physical fatigue, clinical depression, post traumatic stress [00:07:00] disorder. And even cardiovascular damage, it weakens your immune system. It damages your memory. It's incredible what it can do. It even can actually like decrease your fertility, your sex drive, and it can accelerate the aging problem, the aging process on top of that, right?

Fear is a little scary. And a lot of us, a lot of us get hung up on fear in our lives. But I want to challenge you today because if you change your attitude about fear, it can be really beneficial. So instead of looking all at that night, I know I built a, Whoa, Whoa, it was me case, right? I want you to know what fear is doing in your life, because I want you to know with a little simple change, what it can do in your life in a positive direction.

That's right. We're going to turn this into a positive guys. So here are a few ways that deciding to look at fear differently can improve your life. Fear has kept you [00:08:00] alive up until now, keeps you living and breathing. Fear can be a positive thing. It's smart to be fearful of experiences or circumstances that can speed up your journey to the grave.

You know, tying a bunch of dead fish to yourself and jumping in the middle of the ocean with a bunch of sharks. Fear keeps us from doing that. Fear acts as a hidden alarm that rings when in danger, when you, your brain is processing whether you are or not that you're in danger. So it can be a beneficial thing in that regard.

Fear can also help you focus on the present moment. Spoke earlier about how the fear cranks up your nervous system, makes you more aware. This can actually help you stay focused on the present moment guys, if you control it. Right. These things only get better. Fear can only be positive if you control it.

We're sometimes so worried about what we have to do later today or tomorrow. Next week, we're worried about missing on that fear. Missing out is huge, right? FOMO or whatever they want to call it. The fast pace [00:09:00] of life today. And as many distractions keep us from paying attention. To the present moment. And we talk about being present a lot here on this channel because everybody misses so much when we're focused on tomorrow all the time, we're simply existing, not really living.

If we're just focused forward all the time and not actually experiencing the moment. Fear can bring you back to what's going on right now. Norepinephrine is produced when fear rises, which means clearer thinking under stress. It allows you to focus rather than freak out. So tap into that. Everybody has that fight or flight response, right?

For a lot of people, that makes us run. Use the advantage of your brain. When you get scared, your thinking actually can become more short. Sharp and clear. If you take a breath, right? We've talked about this on other shows. We've talked about this with the stunt man, John Anderson that we had on the show.[00:10:00]

Take some deep breaths, two or three deep breaths. We'll arrest that fight or flight. And it will give your brain time for that Norepinephrine to kick in and get some clarity on the moment. And it'll help you identify and be present in the right. Now, don't let the worry about tomorrow or what's coming down the pipeline.

Keep you from experiencing today. Facing your fear also helps you grow. Have you ever stood up to your fear? Have you ever actually like just stared it in the eye? Maybe you're afraid of heights. So you went up on an overlook on a tall building just to kind of expose yourself to that, try and get it down, right?

Maybe you're afraid of dogs. And so you sat down with your friend's dog, even though it kind of terrifies you because you know, your friend's dog is a great dog. Have you tried something like that? You might realize that it wasn't as Powerful or scary as you thought it might be at first, how did it make you feel when you actually challenged that [00:11:00] fear and kind of faced it?

Your self esteem probably enjoyed a nice healthy boost. Like, Hey, I actually did that right. That was good. When you face fears, you can grow in a number of ways. Fear of failure might keep you working in an entry level position for years and years and years, never moving forward. Most people are too afraid to ask for a promotion or go after the next job.

Your fear of not being good enough to handle more responsibility could tie you back from things that could make your life great. Face down your fear and your financial health could improve as well. You find that you're not as stressed out about money as you used to be, so there's less anxiety in your life.

Because you're actually chasing those goals or chasing that better job, right? You have more control of your employment because now you're a boss rather than having to take orders from everybody because you face that fear about taking on more responsibility. This is a simple example of how facing the common fear can help you grow and improve.[00:12:00]

Fear actually makes you smarter. Did you know that? There's someone you want to ask out on a date. Unfortunately, you're scared to death. They'll turn you down. You see this a lot with men these days. When you look at this as a learning situation and possibly a positive outcome rather than a negative one, you take the power out of the fear.

Whether you land your dream date or not, you now have more information. If you go ahead and face that fear and ask that person out. Look at what happened. Whether the outcome was good or bad, what did you learn? Each time we reimagine a fearful idea as a possibility, something we can turn to our advantage and we gain knowledge.

Right? So take the time to break it down. We talk about this a lot on the channel. How you can take a failure and it's not a failure if you learn and grow from it. Fear is also a powerful motivator. Most conscious decisions are driven by only two desires. A person is [00:13:00] seeking pleasure or trying to avoid pain.

Psychiatrists will tell you that the most powerful of these two factors is avoiding a painful experience. Some people get fed up with giving into a particular fear. They've had enough. They're going to change their life so they don't deal with that fear again. The person who constantly faces a fear of dying because of a chronic illness finally decides to adopt a healthier lifestyle.

He becomes healthier in the mind and body, and every day he's not sick and feeling terrible. He is motivated to continue making healthier changes. Courage also isn't possible without fear. Did you know? Courage doesn't mean the absence of fear. We know that. We've all heard that quote. It's what happens when someone faces a fear and takes it action.

Even though they're scared out of their mind, they're, they're still They did something. Courage is facing your fears head on. Maybe that was going to the top of that building for you are for asking that girl out, maybe it was sitting with that dog or asking your boss for a raise promotion, [00:14:00] understanding you might create a wonderful outcome and facing your fears is courage.

In any case, your courage grows and you become less fearful of situations. that might have terrified you in the past. Low self confidence is both a symptom and a cause of fear. Your confidence in dealing with certain situations plummets if your thoughts are fearful. When your self confidence isn't very high, this leads to more fearful thinking.

It kind of feeds on itself. Fortunately, looking at fear a little different can raise your confidence. When you start to tackle fear, when you start to face it, when you start to see it, not as a limiting factor, you can raise your confidence. You see your fearful ideas as getting in the way of you creating your best life.

If you look at it with the right perspective, this can move your thoughts from fear to anger. You're upset at the situation that caused you fear. This logically gets you [00:15:00] thinking about ways to eliminate that fear. You do a little research and discover that there's plenty of people who've done the same thing and successfully removed fears from their minds.

You take action yourself and realize all your worries have been wasted. This is success where you thought you would fail and your confidence rises. You can also get a good boost of self confidence when fears lead to failure. When you decide to believe that you could handle a situation, maybe you had a difficult conversation with a close friend, this is a common fear.

You want to avoid separation or abandonment from this person because you keep putting off what you actually need to talk to them about. You finally decide that ignoring the issue isn't helping, then the talk doesn't go well. Maybe your friend decides he doesn't value your friendship as much as you do.

Maybe they're removing themselves from your life. It's a tough outcome, but the fact that you faced your fear improves your self image. Your confidence grew because you took action to do what was [00:16:00] best for you, even though it was difficult. That confidence is infectious and moves to other parts of our lives.

Before you know it, you have the faith in your ability to do many things. This all came from, uh, albeit a complicated decision, but the decision was to face a fear. And yeah, there might be some negative outcomes, but there's also going to be a lot of positive outcomes when you tackle it. You decided fear would not control you.

Instead, you would take action to create the best possible outcome, win or lose. You should feel better about yourself. It will help you grow and you can move forward. Fear has a lot of negative impact in our life. It can keep you from achieving your dreams. It can keep you from chasing your purpose, your goals.

It can keep you from meeting somebody that could change your life radically. Maybe it's asking that girl out, or maybe is that meeting that new person? Who's now a friend who changed your [00:17:00] life incredibly because of that friendship. It can also keep negative people in your life and it can hurt your health.

But fear doesn't have to be all bad. Use that fear, control it, take that breath, slow yourself down and focus in on what it can teach you, what it can provide you and how you can utilize it to make the best version of you. And I promise life will work out better for you when you had it on, when you face fear head on and use it.

As a growth catalyst instead of as something holding you back. Let me know what you guys think be better tomorrow because which you today, and we'll see you in the next one. This has been the fellow man podcast. You're home to everything, man, husband, and father. Be sure to subscribe. So you don't miss a show, head over to www.

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