The Art of Being Afraid
The greatest virtue is courage
“If you don’t like something, just take away its only power — your attention”
The first time I gave a presentation in a room full of people, I cried. I was not nine, neither was I twelve. I was eighteen and it was a college debate for the position of departmental financial officer. I was fretful, spoke gibberish, and stammered like my tongue was tied. I cried because I knew that fear had messed me up, standing in front of the classroom, the eyes of each person seemed to pierce into my soul and draw out deep depths of insecurities that I had masked away for years. I had ruined my reputation among my peers forever but I didn’t let what they thought of me keep me down.
Fear is as old as time. If I were a historian, I’d have given the example of how fear instilled the right amount of adrenalin in our ancestors to be able to fight or take flight, when faced with a predator. But in recent times, I’ve realized that fear is more learned than it is instinctive. For instance, a child is not born with the instinct to be afraid of bugs, some even eat them. The fear comes when they watch adults react constantly in fear of the bugs.
I’ve lived the majority of my life in fear of public speaking, but today by God’s grace I gave a presentation at work and was commended for my eloquence. Eloquence from where? After the presentation, I sat down to continue my work for the day and remembered the girl who cried bitterly after giving a terrible campaign in front of a multitude of people. How did I get here, let’s walk a little.
I was that kid who people wouldn’t notice in a group setting except when spotted by a sensitive individual. But, that all changed when I read self-help books. Now let me just clear muddled waters, I still am the kid who people most likely wouldn’t notice in a group, but I am a lot more confident about public speaking than I was a few years ago.
My take on self-help books — I once saw a tweet on X (If it’s no longer called Twitter, why do we still call it a tweet? I once saw a post on X) where someone said, and I paraphrase, that no matter how low he might get, he would never read a self-help book. I thought that was quite ignorant of him to say because the majority of the help I’ve gotten for anxiety, fear, money, productivity, etc was all from self-help books.
The day I learned that fear exists only in the mind, was the beginning of my freedom.
“You can conquer almost any fear if you will only make up your mind to do so. For remember, fear doesn’t exist anywhere except in the mind” — Dale Carnegie
I noticed that my first thoughts to being in the spotlight were that of failure. I had failed so many times at public speaking that I no longer expected anything to go right. I learned by experience the fear of public speaking. My initial thoughts were; what if I stammer? what if I forget what I’m about to say? Nobody believes that I am good at this, so why prove them wrong?
Through self-help books, I learned that your life flows in the direction of your most prominent thought so instead of setting myself up for failure by thinking about everything that could go horribly wrong, I began thinking of everything that could go right. This change in my thought pattern helped me make so much progress in my public speaking.
Do I still get nervous before any speaking engagement? yes, most definitely, but you can feel fear and do it anyway, that’s courage. Courage is not doing something without fear, it’s doing it in spite of the fear that you feel.
Courage first starts from your mind, so think right thoughts.
This reminds me of the verse in Philippians 4:8 which says “Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.”
The books I read were — Approval Addiction by Joyce Meyer and The Magic of Thinking Big by David J. Schwartz.
Here’s to 30 days of writing without restraint.
Day 22/30
Till next time,
Love and Light.
