Overcome Your Fears- 17 Tips to Overcome Your Personal Fears

All of us have fears. Some are healthy, some are not. Unhealthy fears can stop us from being our best or achieving what we are potentially capable of. We all have talents, abilities, dreams, aspirations. But we don't get to achieve our full potential or achieve what we really want. There are 3 main types of fear that can stop you from achieving the life of your dreams.

1. Fear of failure
2. Fear of success
3. Fear of ridicule

1. Fear of failure is quite normal . But if it becomes excessive it can be paralyzing. Fear of failure can be seen in the following situations:

Hesitating or refusing to answer a question even though you are almost positive you know the correct answer
Passing up a chance to take on a new task even though it would likely reap great reward
"I can't" "I don' think" as common in you vocabulary.
Relinquishing a position even though you are quite capable of it.

2. Fear of success is a little more subtle.
Here are some common situations where fear of success is probably exists.

When you wont' want responsibilities because you fear you won't be able to cope with the fame or responsibilities attached with it.
Feeling that you can't live up to what others expect of you.
Setting relatively low expectations of yourself because you don't want to succeed.
Passing up an opportunity to get ahead because you feel you don't deserve it.
Avoiding or dismissing praise.

3. Fear of ridicule
No human being wants to be put down. And can be pretty disheartening. To be thought of as a fool, can prevent perfectly normal people from taking risks, branching out to chart new and unknown paths.

Solution? Slay the dragon, face the fears. Here are 17 suggestions to overcome your fears

1. Do something simple that you will succeed in but is also relatively challenging or have been putting off. Do it for just 5 minutes.

2. Write as many answers and responses as you can to : " What I fear most about failure is...."
Think. What can be the worst thing that can happen if fail. Will I die? Can I face my friends and family again? Can I face myself again if I fail? The worst thing that could happen probably wasn't that bad after all. You didn't land up in the lion's stomach.

3. Learn from your failures, and be smarter the next time. This will eliminate the failure cycle when you have learnt and experienced success.

4. Set yourself up for success in little steps. And be proud of your successes. Success breeds success.

5. Reward yourself. In proportion to the success. For example, if you have managed to stop yourself from eating that snack in order to lose weight, don't reward yourself by splurging on diamond ring.

6. Ask yourself- Do I really want to succeed? How would I feel if I did? What would I feel if I didn't succeed? Did you feel yourself not relishing the thought of success? Then perhaps you really do not want to succeed.

7. Re-examine your goals. Dig into yourself to find what you really want. If you fear success, it may not be what you really want. Or that you have to overcome the fear of other things that responsibilities bring. If you find yourself really wanting to succeed, overcome the fear of all those blocks standing in the way, including taking up more responsibilities.

8. Clarity is power. Ask yourself what you are willing to do to achieve your goals, what you are unwilling to do, and what it is that you are unwilling to give up. Look at the pros and cons of each goal and decide if it is worth it to go for.

9. Affirm yourself. Love yourself. Be so big that any opinion will not affect you.

10. Avoid sabotage friends- only those who will affirm you or help you along the path to what you will be at your best and what you really want.

11. Hold fast to your principles.

12. Keep your plans confidential. Wet blankets are all around.

13. Keep your self esteem high. If you develop good self esteem, you will feel worthy enough to experience success and not be easily bruised when you encounter failure. It is the ultimate anecdote for all the above fears.

14. Overcoming fears with hypnosis may be useful. Simply put, hypnosis is simply a way of rewriting and replaying messages that are played in the subconscious. Affirm yourself with self hypnosis and rewrite the script of your life. Visualize yourself achieving success and overcoming ridicule and other blocks. And you will.

15. Rethink your definition of success and failure. Failure is not failure if you treat it as a learning experience. Success as you imagined may not be what you really want after all.

16. Stay flexible, and be willing to adjust your strategy.

17. Aim to achieve congruence in all areas. If you are congruent with what you want, you will have laser sharp focus. You will not fear ridicule if you want to achieve a goal that is in line with your values and vision badly enough. You will go through all odds if something is important enough to you to achieve.

The key is to find out what you want and go for it.

Unwaveringly.

Fearlessly.

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