When it comes to emotions, fear is like a Ninja assassin. It’s the sneaks up on you and it can take over your life. The tragedy of this is that you will recognize it while it’s happening. You’ll wake up one day and suddenly, you’re just a different person. Your hope, courage and determination will have disappeared.
We’ve compiled five signs that you can review to help you determine whether fear is keeping you from achieving all you desire. We’ll also give you some tips on how to overcome your fears and keep them from taking over your life.
Your Decisions are Affected By the Reactions of Others
When we’re looking for acceptance by our friends and peers, we allow their thoughts to seep into our subconscious and start to control our behaviors. Suddenly, they are the ones that are controlling how we think, act, talk and behave. If you find yourself wondering every day of either you should share your thoughts, dreams and goals because you feel you will have to defend yourself, your fear of rejection is stopping you.
The simplest way to escape this cycle is by renewing your conviction to achieving your goals. You have to emotionally disassociate yourself from worried about how people will react. Make your dreams and goals the focus of your attention. Setting up realistic goals that are comfortable to achieve will divert your attention from your fear of rejection.
You Never Offer Your Opinion
Fear of criticism can be just as devastating as a fear of rejection. Your actions and decisions can be subdued by a fear of criticism.
If you hesitate to offer any kind of insight or opinion in a conversation, you’re afraid of what people might say. This kind of behavior can have a negative impact on your workplace environment and at home. People will think you’re either being deceptive or simply not interested in contributing to the conversation. In either case, you are reinforcing a negative attitude towards yourself.
Renew your determination and courage. Recognizing that everyone has to deal with the fear of criticism. The ones that don’t let criticism get in their way are the ones that will eventually find their voice and succeed. They find peace of mind by respecting themselves and their own ideas enough to share them with the world.
You’re Hesitant to Try New Things
The fear of failing is a powerful emotion. It can stop you in your tracks then make you hesitant to take on anything that involves a challenging project.
Like all other types of fear, its Ninja powers strike you without you even realizing it’s happening. You may not even recognize it as fear. It shows up in your behaviors such as an anxiety attack, self-sabotage and, more often than not, as procrastination.
Notice if you’re using negative statements to describe your lack of talents. If your same things to yourself or two others such as, “I am never going to be good enough to be a part of that ensemble,” or, “I could never play as well as they do,” these negative comments are indicative of a fear of failing. Essentially, you set yourself up as a failure before you even try something.
Some people use motivational messages stuck to their bathroom mirrors with great success. It sounds too good to be true, but it does work.
To try it yourself, hang up message or two for yourself on the bathroom mirror so that you’ll see it when you wake up in the morning. You’ll start to see it yourself and a new light, thinking more positive thoughts and noticing a rise in your self esteem.
You Avoid Doing the Right Thing
As we’ve seen in recent years, peer pressure is a powerful force. We may come close to selling our souls for fear of suffer a backlash.
It could be that you simply want to be accepted or it could be that you don’t want to step on anyone’s toes. What do you do when you’re faced with a choice between right and wrong? You do the unthinkable. You simply do nothing.
You become a person who forgets their principles. The ultimate fear of repercussions are retaliation for standing up for your principles prevents you from taking any kind of action whatsoever.
The steps to remedy these feelings are two-fold:
- Make a conscious decision what your principles truly are and then be prepared to fight for them. You’ll probably be a few minutes by yourself to think on these but they could be the most important moments of your life.
2. Another thing you can do is to write down your fears on a piece of paper and then tear them up and tossed them away. It’s this type of action that settles in your brain that these fears no longer have a hold over you and your behavior.
You Settle for Whatever Life Hands You
Somewhere along the way you have settled in your job you’ve settled in your relationship than you settled in your health. Maybe you try to convince yourself that this is as good as it gets. You’re wrong. That thought is actually fear of rejection taking over.
Settling isn’t a realistic idea. There’s a principle that states if you are not moving forward, you’re moving backward. Settling doesn’t give anyone hope and destroys creativity and joy.
Another symptom of fear is shown by trying to micromanage everything. If you feel you need to control everything all of the time, this is a symptom of fear.
One way to overcome this is by starting to take small risks. What may feel like a risk to you may not feel like a risk to anyone else but the point here is to get off the sidelines and get in the game. Taking risks shows you the side of yourself that can achieve more, that can dream bigger, and achieve goals that you have put out the backburner for far too long.
Different Types of Fears that Hold You Back
Fear hides in the shadows of our sub-conscious mind, waiting for a moment of uncertainty to derail our dreams. Recognize these types of fears and understand that they are something all of us have to deal with in one way or another.
- Fear of the unknown.
- Fear of making a mistake.
- Fear of criticism.
- Fear of failure.
- Fear of abandonment.
- Fear of not being popular.
Tips For Overcoming Your Fears
Take this article as a wake-up call to recognize that much of what holds you back from realizing your dreams is based in fear.
Fear not! Here are some tips that can help you find the courage you need to move forward.
Practice these tips and remember that it’s like anything else, you’ll get better at it the more you do it. These answers may be simple, but simple isn’t always as easy to do as it first appears.
- Question your values.
- Have faith in yourself.
- Meditate.
- Practice mindfulness.
- Keep a journal.
- Realize that you’re not alone.
