How To Overcome Fear !

A lot has been said and written about how to overcome fear.




But no matter how many books people read on the subject of fear or how much advice they get, if they don't apply it, their knowledge is worth nothing.



If you want to overcome fear, you have to want to do it bad enough.



If you don't have a strong desire to do, have or achieve something, you will not. So it's important to be absolutely determined to get rid of your fear once and for all.



If you don't take risks, you've lost without even trying. Those who live lives in fear regret when their life is over. You are here to experience new things and to grow, to overcome your fears and enjoy a higher standard of life. The knowledge of how to overcome fear, therefore, is essential if you want to enjoy your life.



How to overcome fear – The gradual method



Let me tell you how I overcame my fear – quitting my job. This was a big fear for me because I really wanted to quit my job, but I was scared that I will not be able to pay my rent and pay my bills. But I was determined to quit my job as soon as possible, so I came up with the plan.



I decided to push myself to work harder on my business so that the money I get from it would be able to cover my expenses. I knew that quitting job without having significant income outside the job was not a wise decision, therefore I decided to set a goal of earning enough to be able to quit.



I visualised my business becoming profitable and worked very hard to achieve this goal. After around a year of my hard work I was able to quit my job. The fear of quitting my job was gone because I knew that the money supply wouldn't finish after I leave my employment.



So sometimes facing the fear immediately is not the wisest decision. Think about your fear. Maybe you can come up with the strategy which would dissolve the fear painlessly.



How to overcome fear – The fast method



Sometimes to overcome some fear you have to face it without any delay. This is very beneficial for your personal development because facing your fears makes you grow and takes you outside of your comfort zone.



To face the fear, however, you have to have a strong motivation behind this goal. Why do you want to overcome the fear? How would that benefit you?



Also, think of the worst thing that could happen to you if you face your fear. For example, maybe you want to have more friends, but you are scared to talk to strangers. The worst that could happen to you in this scenario is probably embarrassment.



So it's not that bad – you don't die and you don't get physically hurt. Isn't it worth to face the fear and finally talk to someone or does a one-time embarrassment matter more than a potential life-long friendship?



So when you want to face the fear immediately, think of the benefits and the drawbacks of facing your fear. Then you will realise (in most cases) that the benefits far outweigh the drawbacks and therefore you will not feel scared to take the action you always wanted to take. ***z-middle-ad.shtml***



How To Overcome Fear – Eliminate small fears first



If you still think you will be unable to face your fear, start from overcoming smaller fears. When you see that you can overcome your small fears, you will move on to bigger ones until you can face your major fear.



If you are scared of spiders, for example, go to a zoo and have a guide talk about them and try to touch them under the supervision of a guide or someone in charge of looking after them. If you are scared of heights, overcome this fear by gradually climbing higher and higher up a ladder. If you are scared of saying “no” to people, start by saying "no" to kids, then teenagers and then older people. Also, start saying “no” for insignificant things like someone asking if you can do something of little importance, and then move on to the bigger ones.



How to overcome fear – Quantum leap



If you want to make a major progress and overcome your big fear, face it without going through your smaller fears. This will save you time but it's harder to accomplish. However when you overcome this fear, it will seem that you can do anything, you will feel much more relaxed, you won't get stressed as much and you will feel happier.



To do that, you have to stop thinking about your fear. The more your think about it, the more it paralyses you and makes you frightened. So the best advice to overcome your biggest fear is “Just do it”.



Don't think about it. Go ahead and do it. The more you think about it, the more you will delay taking action. If you want to think about any aspect of it, think about the benefits that you will get once you are over this fear, but don't let your mind wander into a “What if I fail” question, because it will discourage you.



How to overcome fear – Tim Ferris advice



I remember when I first read “The 4-Hour Workweek” book, there was a great exercise suggested about overcoming fear. In the book it was suggested to go out and ask a phone number from a member of the opposite sex. That looks really hard thing to do, especially for a female.



I've never in my life chatted up any guy before, so this exercise seemed extremely hard. However I love challenges and I love to overcome my fears, so I didn't just put the book aside in the hope that some day I will do that, but I went out and did it.



I simply stopped thinking about what could go wrong, approached the first guy that was on my way and asked him his phone number. Once I opened my mouth and started talking, I no longer was scared to death. It didn't seem as scary as how I thought it would be.



The guy was extremely surprised and didn't say anything for a bit, then he smiled, took out his mobile phone and asked if I have a piece of paper to write the number on. I obviously didn't think the plan through so I didn't have any pen or a piece of paper. I told him that I will remember his number because I have a good memory (sort of:)



When he gave me his number, I thanked for that (he thanked me too) and we went our separate ways. I was so happy that I eliminated this fear because that proved that I can overcome any fear with this method.



How to overcome fear – Fear or phobia?



There is a big difference between a regular fear and phobia. Phobia is a much more extreme fear causing panic attacks and even mental breakdowns. So if you suffer from phobia rather than fear, you need to use other ways to overcome it.



NLP has many great techniques to get rid of phobias. I will give you one of them.



Imagine that you are in a cinema watching yourself on the screen. In the movie you see yourself in the time when you first got the phobia (or at least around the time you got the phobia). Watch yourself getting scared of the thing that produced phobia and what you did afterwards.



Then watch the same movie in black and white. Once you are done, watch the movie in a fast mode. Then watch it backwards. Then remember a funny song and add it to the movie whilst it's in black and white and fast playing backwards.



When you have gone through this self-therapy, test it by facing your phobia. You can only find out if the technique was successful once you face your fear. Also, it can have variations – you can include music earlier or you can play it fast right at the end.



In this video you can see the technique I've just described to you. Watch the video to understand this NLP technique better.




http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZRDwhqXWu-A&feature=player_embedded#!



If this method doesn't work, do it again or seek other NLP techniques, because they are really useful. A great book to read about NLP techniques is The Big Book Of NLP Techniques by Shlomo Vaknin. Another great book to read on the subject of fear and how to overcome fear is Feel the Fear... and Do It Anyway by Susan Jeffers.



How To Overcome Fear – conclusion



I hope that my methods will be useful to you and you will overcome your fear(s) as a result. Remember, if you don't overcome your fears, you don't grow. If you don't grow, you stay stuck in life. Yes, it's quite uncomfortable to face your fears, but sometimes you have to experience a bit of discomfort to get to a more comfortable place.



Good luck in facing your fears and don't think much about it – just do it!