Destruction of your career with minor fears

Almost everyone has some form of irrational fear.  Clearly severe fears or phobias can interfere with normal day-to-day jobs - one with severe claustrophobia might feel the need turn down a job that involves taking a lift.

One with a severe fear of heights may give up on a better paid job working in a high rise.

One with social phobia may avoid working with others at all costs to avoid being judged.

However, minor fears or anxieties can also interfere with your own performance in the long term. If you feel anxious in enclosed places you might find yourself feeling uncomfortable every time you step into the enclosed office of your boss, feeling woozy every time you are asked to attend a conference with a large group, or making excuses to miss important meetings with others located in small rooms. With a slight fear of heights, you may find yourself taking the time and expending more fuel to drive an extra 10 miles to avoid a tall bridge, avoid speaking to team colleagues sitting by windows, or venture less down the flights of stairs to interact with other departments. They may seem insignificant each time, yet these fears aren't going to go away if you do not do anything about it, and over time, these little things can amount and impact on your work, for example, leaving you with negative feelings about your boss or reluctant to give to conferences that provide you with opportunities, or damaging your ability to save money or network and gain reputation.



Even worse, as time goes by the fear can get worse and become more severe. We've all heard about Pavlov's conditioning or know about how training a dog works. We tell a dog to sit and give it a reward when it does and by repeating this, the dog learns to associate sitting with a reward. Unfortunately humans as just like animals when it comes to learning. Only with fears the reward is not a good one. The first few times you see or experience your fear, it causes you anxiety you cannot control. Each time it occurs again, the association strengthens. After some time, just thinking about the feared object of situation will make you nervous and each time that occurs, the association is strengthened even further in our neural connections. You can imagine what could happen with time if you let your fears continue.

Right now, we all have a choice, to keep these severe or minor fears, which prevent us from living the life in the most enjoyable way, or to live a carefree life without fear. Why would you choose to keep the fears and let them potentially become more severe? Why are you CHOOSING to let them inconvenience you and make you change your lifestyles to accommodate them when you don't even want or need?

Here are just some of the typical fears we may have:

Fear of public speaking - fear of social situations where you may be judged, embarrassed or humiliated
Do you really want to avoid career advancing opportunities to present to others and make yourself know, or be talked about as the manager or leader who cannot or avoids speaking directly to large teams?

Fear of failure - fear of taking risks and inclination to play it safe
Do you really want to pass up valuable opportunities and learn from less useful options to make better choices?

Fear of rejection - fear of feeling undesired, 
Do you really want to regret doing things, finding out what could have happened and missing opportunities?

Fear of conflict - fear of expressing your true feelings, opinions, wants and desires
Do you really want to create a lack of understanding and cause conflict with others as a result of having this fear or conflict within yourself from not be truthful about your true self?

Fear of success - the fear of being more superior and different from others and having what others are seeking
Do you really want to never be successful by holding on to this fear and have something to be proud of, something you have achieved?

Fear of making decisions - fear of choosing, making wrong choices, and the inclination to procrastinate to avoid decisions
Do you want to continue letting others take credit for the right decisions or tread on all opportunities to advance to more senior positions where decisions are required?


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