Category Archives: Fear

Embrace Your Fears

Don't Run Away

Don’t Run Away

​Fear is an often misunderstood feeling, or emotion.

One the one hand, it’s useful for survival purposes, as it keeps us safe.

Way back in the old caveman days, either fighting or flighting was both part of the same strategy, to not get killed or eaten.

One compels to avoid, one compels us to engage. If we are going to avoid, we have a sudden burst of energy to run away. If we choose to engage, we have a burst of energy to overcome whatever obstacle is in front of us.

A great modern day metaphor is public speaking. Or more generally speaking while being at the center of public attention.

If you’re out with your buddies or something, and suddenly everybody’s staring at you for some reason, you may choose the “flight” option. You wouldn’t actually run away, but you’d remove yourself from the center of attention any way you could. Make a quick joke, find somebody else to shift the attention to, etc.

On the other hand, you could choose to engage. Not start throwing punches, but accept the situation, and use your sudden burst of energy to make the best of it. Make your voice louder and more confident. Feel the energy rush through you and consciously channel it to something powerful and magnetic.

Now, this is NOT the way most people think about “fear.” They think it’s to be avoided at ALL COSTS. They spend their whole lives purposely getting into situations just so they can AVOID anything fearful or anxiety causing.

But like all of our other instincts that helped us survive in the past, this is something we need to deal with today.

Take hunger, for example. In the past, we ate as much as we could whenever we could. But if we tried that now, we wouldn’t be able to fit out of our front doors. So most of us have to “manage” our hunger. We are careful when we shop. We avoid certain foods, knowing they are bad for us.

But we also know that certain foods are good for us. And that eating is one of life’s great pleasures. Sharing a special meal with a special someone is a wonderful experience that many of us repeat as often as we can.

Fear, or that sudden pulse of energy can be the same way. Managed the same way. Used the same way. Enjoyed the same way.

Accept it. Embrace it. Use it as the tool it was meant to be.

Just don’t avoid it.

Learn More:

How To Release The Brakes

Release The Brakes

Trust Yourself

​Once I had to move from one apartment to another, a few hours apart.

I rented a big U-Haul truck. I drove between these two cities a lot.

But when I was driving the moving truck, it took a lot longer.

I guess for insurance purposes, they had a “governor” on the accelerator.

You couldn’t go more than the speed limit.

They have these mountain bike tours in Hawaii, and other places.

You ride to the top of these LONG hills (in a van) with gorgeous views. Then you coast down, on your bikes.

Only for safety, the bikes have breaks that are set permanently. Meaning you CAN’T go very fast.

Otherwise somebody would go too fast, crash, and that would be that for the tour company.

Once I was riding a skateboard from a friends dorm, back to mine, in college.

In between was this HUGE hill. One I was too scared to ride down during the day.

Only that night, after having a couple, I had an INCREASE in confidence.

Unfortunately, it was only imaginary confidence. Not confidence based on experience.

Needless to say, I crashed. 

I used to live near these hills. I had a pretty decent mountain bike. I’d ride up and down those hills after work, and on the weekends.

There was one hill that was fantastic. Amazing views from the top. A long, steep decline, which curved slightly to the right.

The no lights or intersections on the way down. And at the bottom, it was flat for about half a mile before the first light.

PERFECT for seeing how fast you could go.

The fastest I ever went was 53 mph, just coasting.

And that was only having released the brakes just for about twenty seconds.

No speed wobbles. I had all the safety gear, but it was still plenty scary.

AND plenty exhilarating.

Brakes are like your inhibitions. Sometimes they are there for a reason. Sometimes you can release them for the wrong reasons.

But when you release them for the RIGHT reasons, it’s REALLY exciting.

What’s even better, any fear you feel during that excitement is all in your mind.

It’s not like riding down a steep hill where one wrong move could transform you into hamburger meat!

But when you release your interpersonal inhibitions completely, the excitement is JUST as real. 

How do you do that?

First you’ll need to do some exercises specially designed to retrain the way you think about these things.

Then you’ll learn how to communicate with others, in a way that will make THEM feel that excitement just because you are around.

Which means YOU will be able to not only FEEL that exhilaration, but create it at will, within anybody you meet.

Learn How:

Are You Boxed In By Fear?

The Cage Is Imaginary

The Cage Is Imaginary

​Things that we are most afraid of will never happen.

Sure, we all are going to die. We all know loved ones that have died or will die in the future.

This is part of life.

But when you walk up to that attractive person to start a conversation, there’s very little probability they’ll laugh at you or call the cops.

And if you go into your bosses office and ask for a raise, they won’t likely fire you on the spot.

Trouble is, that our brains are hard wired to be MUCH more sensitive to POTENTIAL danger than potential pleasure.

Meaning if there’s a forty percent chance we’ll get a raise, and a one percent chance we’ll get fired, our caveman brains will focus on that one percent like it’s 99 percent.

That kept us alive when there were critters hiding in the bushes waiting to eat us.

Even though they aren’t there any more, we’re still using an outdated version of brain software.

The good news is that you CAN upgrade your brain. But it’s not like Windows, when you shut off your PC And it goes through about 27 upgrades before finally shutting down.

If you want to upgrade your brain, you’ve got to do it consciously. This takes time. This takes effort.

How do you do it?

Meditation. Focused visualization. Forcing yourself in uncomfortable situations if only to PROVE your worst fears will never come true.

Journaling is also another great way. Just write down all the stuff that happened, at the end of the day. Write down what you did. Write down what happened. Write down what you may be able to do differently next time.

This is really the way the brain operates anyhow. Learning by trial and error. Only by doing daily journaling, you’re taking the trial and error (or trial and feedback) and elevating it to a conscious level.

Kind of like fighting someone using only instincts, vs. fighting someone after having trained in a Dojo for ten years.

Many people spend YEARS working on their bodies. Or their careers. Or their hobbies.

But few people even know how to work on their brains. Let alone make the effort.

But consider this. If you spent 30 minutes a day practicing the piano, you’d be pretty good in a few years.

So good you’d be able to sit down at any party and bang out some pretty good tunes.

What about working on your brain?

If you spent only five or ten minutes every night, doing some focused mental exercises or journaling, you’d be a super hero social ninja after a short while.

You’d make more money, have a much more rewarding romantic life, and be much more fulfilled.

Isn’t that worth a few minutes of your time every night?

Which exercises should you do?

There’s plenty in here to choose from:

Turn Fear Into Power

Let Loose Your Juice

Tap Your Hidden Reservoirs

There’s a theory of human energy that we always have a hidden reservoir.

This is that energy mothers get when they move cars to save their kids.

It’s also the energy we have when it comes time to flee an escaped tiger.

The theory goes that if we were ever consciously aware of this energy, we’d use it.

And if all of a sudden, there was an avalanche, or some sort of catastrophe happened, we’d be screwed.

So nature kept his reserve hidden from us, so when we REALLY needed it, it would always be there.

Kind of like our greatest powers. They say our greatest powers are right behind our greatest fears.

Kind of like an axe that’s stuck behind a big plate of glass. If there’s a fire, we HAVE to break the glass to get the axe.

If we are in desperate NEED of our greatest powers, that need to push us through our greatest fears.

And BAM, we have a sudden burst of power.

But this power goes beyond strength, or speed, or resilience.

It also includes creativity, genius level problem solving, massive persuasion skills.

Now, this is how we are programmed.

Which means if we understand it, we can tweak it in our favor.

For example, we don’t have to wait around for some horrific situation to force us through our deepest fears, so we can dig deep and come up with our biggest powers.

Nor do we have to force ourselves through our biggest fears, just to get to the good stuff we KNOW is on the other side.

(As an aside, that IS a pretty good strategy to achieve maximum and IMMEDIATE greatness: ALWYAS look for chances to DO THINGS YOU FEAR.)

We CAN approach this hidden power slowly.

If our maximum fear has maximum power hidden behind it, then small fear will have small power hidden behind it.

And just any good entrepreneur, you can use your “profits” (in this case the powers behind your fears) and plow them back into your business.

Meaning you can take small steps to expand your comfort zone. Get the power that yields. Then USE THAT POWER to help you expand your comfort zone even more.

Giving you even more power, creativity, interpersonal skills and genius level thinking.

You’ll find that pretty much everything you want in life follows this “entrepreneurial model.”

How A Rich Dancer Handled Risk

Dance Your Way To Riches

Don’t Wait Too Long!

Many people have all kinds of negative voices swirling around in our heads.

You think of doing something, and then that doubt pops up.

“What if it doesn’t work? What if you look stupid?”

One of the reasons that voice is so hard to ignore is we convince ourselves it’s trying to “help” us.

“Well, it’s better I didn’t. I wouldn’t have liked it anyway.”

“Wow, I guess I dodged a bullet!”

Many people retreat into the world of the “enlightened skeptic.” They find comfort in the philosophical notion of pointing out how “wrong” everybody is.

“Well, there’s no conclusive evidence that’s going to work, so I’ll sit back here on my throne and let everybody else make those foolish mistakes. I know better.”

Problem with that is since these types are ALWAYS waiting for proof, any time they find proof it’s MUCH too late.

There was an old stock market trader who made a couple million over a couple years. He was a dancer, and traveled the world. He only used telegrams to get updates. (He wrote a book called “How I Made $2 Million in the Stock Market.”)

Once a guy asked him for as stock tip, and he gave him the one he was looking at.

The guy that received the stock tip wanted to “make sure.” He did some research, studied the company, studied the economy, etc.

Finally, he contacted the dancer, and said he was ready to buy some of that stock.

The dancer said, “Well, if you would have bought it when I told you, you would have made 200% already. I don’t think it’s going to go up any more!”

As Dale Carnegie was found of saying, “The sure thing boat never gets too far from shore.”

Meaning if you ONLY take action when you feel it’s safe, you won’t ever get much more than most anybody else.

Which ain’t much!

Does this mean you need to put EVERYTHING on the line, every single time? Not at all. Take that stock market dancer guy. He would buy a stock, but ALWAYS sell IMMEDIATELY if it went down just a little bit.

Meaning he knew how risky it was, and he would GET OUT if there is any danger. 

Sure, you need to take risks. But not jump off cliffs without parachutes, or jump into the shark tank at the zoo.

Small risks. Talking to strangers. Expanding your comfort zone. Spending an hour or so a week looking into what kind of business you might start.

Hanging out with more like-minded folks who are ALSO doing things to improve themselves, rather than forget themselves.

Do this, keep moving forward, and success is certain.

Conjure Your Inner Magician

Blast Away False Fears

How To Vanish False Fears

One thing that humans hate is risk.

One history book I read said that the story of man is one of a frightened, lazy people. All of our inventions were made to keep us safer, and make it easier.

You may even say that all of our instincts are geared to the same end.

Safety in numbers, all kinds of mind triggers and biases to cut down on thinking power.

However, something happened to us humans along the way.

We developed this MASSIVE capability to imagine the future. Not only that, but we somehow came up with language to describe that potential future.

This folded in greatly with our deep need to stay safe and not work too hard.

We could explain to each other where all the great hunting grounds and orchards were.

Elders could spin fascinating tales of mysterious monsters beyond the hills, in an effort to keep youngsters from straying too far from the pack.

However, oftentimes in life there’s something called a “mismatch.” Meaning you’ve got a couple things that work great on their own, but when you mix them together, it’s kind of crappy.

Chocolate pizza, Wasabi ice cream, chicken liver filled valentines candy. None of these would be a great marketing idea.

Similarly, our ability to imagine a potential future, mixed in with our tendency to stay safe doesn’t always help us.

We tend to imagine horrible things that have a very low probability of happening. But they seem so real when we imagine them, we don’t budge.

While our imaginations can help us to create magnificent works of art, medicine, technological wonders, they can also conjure up some pretty frightening events.

Suddenly, walking over and talking to that interesting person seems scarier than jumping out of an airplane.

Starting a small business seems more dangerous than jumping into the tiger cage at the zoo.

Expressing a novel but interesting idea to your boss seems about as safe as sticking your hand down into a running garbage disposal.

Only those that realize that NONE of these fears are real, and push right through them know the truth.

That on the OTHER SIDE of those false fears lies greatness.

YOUR greatness.

Money, wealth, relationships, they’re over there, on the other side, waiting for you.

Are you going to let those ancient fears from your birthright?

Or are you going to PROVE to yourself that those fears are a hallucination? That when you step right through them they will VANISH.

How To Eliminate Social Friction

Slip On Down Into Their Minds

Slippery Skills

When I was a kid we went to this small amusement park.

It had these long slides that required piece of cloth.

Otherwise, you wouldn’t slide very fast, and if you were wearing shorts and caught your skin on the plastic, it didn’t feel so good.

If you’ve ever been on a big water slide, you know much faster you can go when much of the friction (between you and the slide) is removed.

When I was in Junior High School, they talked about a frictionless puck (which was quickly transformed into bathroom humor by all the kids), because talking about friction made everything more complicated.

Air hockey is so much fun because you can hit that puck pretty fast, due to the small cushion of air it’s resting on.

In Japan, they have the mag-lev trains, which can go really, really quickly as there’s no friction between the train and the track. And the front of the “bullet trains” actually look like bullets, as they are designed for minimum air resistance.

Friction is everywhere. And billions are spent trying to minimize it. In games, in amusement parks, in transportation, inside every single engine.

Humans have friction between each other as well. (And I’m not talking about THAT kind of friction that only happens when the clothes come off!)

There’s that social friction that is ALWAYS there. That uncomfortable tension, the small gaps in conversations that seem to last forever. That invisible but powerful force field between you and your boss, or you and that attractive person across the room.

How do you reduce THAT kind of friction?

One way is how you start the conversation. Start off by making it easy on them. Use simple statements that are easy to agree with. Pacing statements, as they are called in hypnosis.

Just mention a few things that MUST be true. Get them thinking in terms of “uh-huh, uh-huh…”

Ease your way into the conversation, making it easy for them to see your perspective.

Spend some time building rapport.

Another way is to simply get rid of all your inner fears and anxieties. No matter how well you hide them (and hide from them) they are there.

And they send off a subtle signal that others can pick up on, subconsciously.

This is why some people seem really friendly, and some people don’t, yet nobody can really put there finger on why.

When you eliminate all that inner chit chat and doubt that often comes up before any social interaction, you’ll also remove a lot of that friction.

This is the definition of charisma. Somebody who just shows up, and the work is done.

People already feel in rapport with them. People have already decided they are friendly and interesting.

People have already decided, on a deep subconscious level, that whatever they are going to say is likely going to be pretty interesting.

YOU can be that person.

Are You Sitting On A Hidden Minefield?

Ditch The Hidden Traps

Stop Tip Toeing Around

How do you respond when you hear or see a child cry, other than your own?

Many perceive it as a nuisance, especially if you’re in church or at the movies.

One interesting thing to do is when you’re out “watching people” in public, check out the reaction of others when a kid starts crying.

Most of the men will look quickly with a slight bit of annoyance.

Some of the women will look at the parent, depending on their own experience.

Maybe both.

There’s a technique called “dark energy” or “shadow energy” whereby we assume that the things about others that bother us are really because they remind us about parts of us we are unwilling or afraid to face.

A way to dig into your own negative energy is to wait until somebody bothers you.

And then instead of getting angry at them, or wishing they’d go away, ask yourself, “What is it about me that they might remind me of?”

And then pay attention to the answer. If you find a part of yourself that don’t particularly like, or aren’t very proud if, simply accept it.

Just sit with it for a while, and accept it. Don’t ignore it or change it.

Many places in the world that have seen plenty of warfare have live mines.

Meaning there’s big fields where farmers can’t farm, kids can’t play, and people can’t take shortcuts.

Since they are so expensive and time consuming to find and remove, they just put up a big fence around it with plenty of warnings.

We also have hidden “mines” within us. Things that suddenly “go off” with you least expect them.

Somebody says something, somebody looks you a certain way, and it might remind you of something far, far back in your past.

Maybe something you’d rather not face. Something you did, or something that was done to you.

The good news is that there is an easy way to get rid of those land mines from your past.

Which will give you a lot more space to play, grow and take shortcuts.

And the process can be a lot of fun.

Learn More:

Emotional Freedom

How To Be Comfortable Around Anybody

Lower Your Shields

Turn Off Your Shield

It’s a very common experience to think of something to say after the fact.

Like you’re in a conversation with your friends, and somebody says something, and you don’t know how to respond.

Then later on, maybe at home or in the car, you think of witty comeback.

Or maybe you’ve had this experience.  You’ve got to give a speech. You practice at home, in front of the mirror, over and over. Then you give the speech, only you don’t remember much of it.

OK, how about this one. You’ve got a great idea in your head. You rehearse what you’re going to say.  Maybe to your boss, your partner, or your kids.

But when you say it, it doesn’t sound nearly as good. Maybe even people look at you like you’re crazy.

That can really hurt. Especially if you were fully expecting them to embrace your idea.

What gives?

Why do we sometimes have so much trouble communicating? It’s not rocket science. We’re not trying to reverse engineer Euclidian Geometry.

The reason is all have a kind of imaginary “bubble” around us. One that pops up unexpectedly.

When we’re with our close friends, it’s rarely present. We can say whatever we want. We know from our experience that they’re our close friends, so we’re not worried about rejection.

But when it’s somebody we don’t really know, AND it’s somebody important, we suddenly are very careful how we speak.

Now, this rarely happens consciously. We don’t carefully choose our words like some high level negotiator or diplomat.

But we do severely limit ourselves. Our chests constrict. Our vocal chords get a bit tighter. We speak from a slightly higher point in our diaphragms.

It’s that ancient “fight or flight” response coming to save us. Only it doesn’t know we’re not going into battle or trying to scare a tiger away from our cave.

We’re just talking to some person, who’s just like us, and we may get something good, we may not.

Think of what you could accomplish, what you could get, if you could talk to ANYBODY as naturally and easily as your close friends.

Not necessarily say the same things, but if you were as relaxed and confident. If you were not worried in the least of rejection.

Talking to your boss, giving speeches, talking to attractive people. 

Just imagine if you were as comfortable talking your boss into giving you a raise as you were convincing your friend to meet you at the corner pub!

The good news is that you can. Because all those fears and anxieties that may be subconsciously holding you back can be ejected.

With the right mental exercises, and some daily journaling, you can get rid of the for good.

Learn How:

Emotional Freedom

What Kind Of Hills Do You Like?

Get In The Game

Get In The Game

I used to go skiing when I was a kid. I belonged to the Explorer Scouts, which was kind of like boy scouts.

But instead of merit badges and helping old ladies cross the street, we just did things like camping and hiking.

And once a year, we all went on this big ski trip to this big mountain resort. Bunch of kids crammed into a cabin, away from out parents, and only a few adults. All of us with crappy equipment that we had to rent. Great fun.

I remember two types of ski runs as a kid. One was steep and flat. One was steep with these HUGE moguls.

Moguls are like little hills, (some not so little) and are kind of put there accidentally by how skiers make a lot of quick turns going down the mountain.

Since I was never good enough to do that, I HATED moguls. I would make this HUGE zig-zags down the mountain, and moguls made that incredible difficult.

Problem was you couldn’t tell which runs had the huge moguls unless you went down the run. So I had to kind of remember which ones did and which ones didn’t.

Once we got the nerve to take the lift up to the biggest, steepest run. We all looked over the edge and said, “No Way!”

So we went down the backside. Through a bunch of trees and back around to the front.

Funny thing was that was likely the most fun we had that trip. It took us a couple hours, since we had no idea where we were going, and a lot of it was pretty flat. But it was an adventure. 

Had we not had the courage to go all the way to the top, we would never have experienced that.

The best things can happen when you least expect them. But unlike the movies, they don’t really happen “to” you, while you’re sitting around.

That’s the great dream of most of us, to be thrust into some kind of adventure without much effort on our part.

But in real life, we’ve got to take part. We’ve got to get out there and get in the mix.

Sure, sometimes we’ll come across these huge scary moguls we’ve got to get around.

Other times, we’ll look down and say “No Way!” and try to find another path.

But those “other paths” are where all the good stuff is.

Amazing things will happen when you get out there and open yourself up to whatever is waiting.

Having the courage to do so will help.

Learn More:

Emotional Freedom