The 4 Types of Emotional Fear

Why are we all so scared of rejection? Your rejection of me has nothing to do about how I show up in the world. Their rejection does not guide your behavior. Rejection is inevitable. Judgment is inevitable. What's more important is I'm not going to be driven by the fear of other people's thinking. I'm going to be driven by the ambition of who I want to become. When you switch into that mode now, courage shows up. When you switch in that mode now intention and character shows up. I don't want you to worry about the rejection. You don't halt making good decisions in your life because of what other people are going to think. Most people, they're not actually experiencing a physical sensation of fear. They are worrying themselves into fear. They got on the merry go round of doubt and they spun themselves into a circle that caused their stomach to get upset, their brain upset, and now they're just worried that things won't turn out well. Most people aren't experiencing fear, they're experiencing worry. And so once we understand it, worry is a projection of a future outcome that's negative, right? It's contemplating something that might not be good in the future. And that worry can spin into fear or anxiety for people. What I want to talk about, though, is the fear that most of us have when we don't make a decision we know we should, and most often, most often comes down to four things. I always teach this, if you ever heard me teach it. There's only four things we actually fear once we remove or move on from the conversation of, like, real fear, like physical safety fear, once we get in beyond that. Most fears are driven by four things. Number one, we don't make the decision because we believe it will cause ruin. I know I need to leave this thing, but it will ruin my reputation. It will ruin my relationship with the kids, it will ruin my finances. It will ruin my future. In other words, we get stuck in a loop of what's called catastrophic thinking. We just imagine taking this action to change will lead to catastrophe. That's called ruin, right? I think by changing, catastrophe will strike. And we blow up this imagined future where we're totally ruined. Our reputation, our relationships, our finances, decimated, ruined, forever, unrecoverable. And this is what your brain does. It gets in that worry loop. It spins it so many times now it's catastrophe, right? We say, oh my God, they're all going to hate me and they're going to shame me and I'll have no friends ever. Which really began as a thought like, what If I don't make friends there, you know, the first thought was a worry. What if she doesn't like me? And then it becomes, oh, my God, they're all going to hate me. They're all going to talk about me. I'm never going to have any friends. I'm going to be alone. Right? The spinning of the worry into this catastrophic, very nonsensical thinking. I always tell people you have to learn to hear catastrophic thinking in your brain. Like a cartoon character, right? Like a cartoon character. Like, I just think of, like, you know, when I think of, like, catastrophic thinking, I just know it's almost cartoony. It's so obnoxious, really. I'm going to be ruined forever. You're not going to be ruined forever. If you end your marriage or your career or your job because you'll do the personal growth work to level up to becoming an even better person. You'll define even more what's right for yourself. You'll make better decisions. You'll stay more committed. Your next stage, you'll learn from the first stage, if you're conscious, if you go and you're same, same trouble. But if you elevate and you learn and you rise from the ashes in a more conscious, intentional way, life will be better. You'll be okay. Okay, I said there's four kinds of fear. Number one is ruin. Spend a lot of time on that. Number two is regret. This is the part of our brain compares and contrasts too much. Well, if I do this, I'm going to regret it. I'm going to regret it because it's not going to be as good as I have it now. I'm going to regret it because it's the wrong decision. I'm going to regret it because I look like a fool. And you immediately jump into regret before even taking the action. I like to tell people, oh, don't worry about regret. Regret happens later. It's too soon to worry about regret. That's what I tell people. I'm like, oh, if you want to have regret, have it. Just. Can we pause on that right now? Let's have it later. Regret doesn't. The good news about regret, it doesn't happen now. So why are you even thinking about it? Don't you love that? I love regret. Regret is the easiest fear to overcome. When you go, oh, it doesn't happen now. Cool. Regret happens later. Of course, this often justifies bad behavior, too. So how funny is that about the human psychology, right? It's like, oh, wait, I don't Regret stealing this candy bar from this store. Well, it's too bad your character didn't say, don't steal candy bar. I wish more people would think about regret, but not in a fear driven way. In a character driven way. In a way that says, I'm going to be a person who is responsible with high values and integrity and character as I move through this. And if you have that intention, you don't have to worry about regret. I don't worry about regret because I'm going to show up as a person of intention and integrity. Let me say that again. I don't even worry about regret. I know by default I will force myself to show up with an intention and integrity. Third thing that we worry about or we have fears about, and this is important to recognize, is that rejection is a fear. Rejection. They won't like me. She won't like me. It's not just catastrophic, it's that sense that we won't be in a place where we're heard, seen, honored, respected, cared for. You know, the idea that you're going to be ostracized or lonely if you make this decision has killed a million dreams, has prevented so many people from moving on. A bad relationship. A lot of people stay in the wrong place because they fear rejection. I'm like, you're already being rejected. You're scared you're gonna be rejected. It's already happened. That's why they're treating you that way. If someone is treating you bad, they've already rejected you. Don't fear it's going to happen. It's already happened. So now make the move, right? The worst case has already happened. You're like, oh, I'm so scared they'll reject you like it already happened. And here's the news to everybody else, if that's too deep, you're already being rejected a hundred times a day. People go by your Instagram. They don't, like, comment, deal with it. They scroll right on by you, right? You pitch the idea at work. They don't hear it, they don't listen to it. Why are we all so scared of rejection? Your rejection of me has nothing to do about how I show up in the world. Think about that. Your rejection of me has nothing to do with how I show up in the world. And, you know, I. I'm in this difficult spot of I like right now. You know, some point, millions of people will see this. Lots of people will hate me. By point number two, right? I've been on, I just spoke to 25,000 people live in a two week tour, like in person, at conferences again, on stage, at big events and arenas and conference centers. And inevitably I'll get a standing ovation at every event. But I know there's some people who don't like me and they're standing up like, glad he's done. It happens. Their rejection does not guide your behavior. Rejection is inevitable. Judgment is inevitable. What's more important is I'm not going to be driven by the fear of other people's thinking. I'm going to be driven by the ambition of who I want to become. When you switch into that mode now, courage shows up. When you switch in that mode now intention and character shows up. I don't want you to worry about the rejection. You don't halt making good decisions in your life because of what other people are going to think. Because here's the good news, most people aren't even thinking, let alone think about you. Isn't it true most people, they're an automatic, they're not thinking at all. There's no strategy. Just thought comes in, thought goes out. Thought comes in, thought goes up, and they're thinking about themselves, not about you. So it's like once you realize no one's really that concerned about you or your life in terms of what you're doing now, you get to go, what do I want to do? Let me stop worrying about them. What's important to me, what do I care about? And when you step into that, there's a whole different level of life. Last big thing that most people fear. And this is why I believe as a coach, most people who understand any of the concepts I've talked about today, when they don't make a decision, the reason they don't make that decision is because the fear of responsibility, what they fear in making the change is the chain is going to bring a new level of responsibility, a new level of demand, a new level of challenge, a new level of uncertainty. Something that will be a new burden to them. I'm gonna have to take on this new thing. I'm gonna have to learn this new skill. I'm gonna have to make new friends, I'm gonna have to take over my finances. And the new obligations that will land on your shoulders when you go to make the change becomes a fear that says, I can't handle it. That's a fear of responsibility. I'm not going to be able to respond to that challenge. That's the fear of responsibility. It's like Marianne Williamson said, right? What we really fear isn't our dark stuff. It's our power, our light, our. Our capability, right? Our real fear is the power that we have because we're scared to exert it, because it will demand of us. And when we exert it, we might be judged. When we exert it, it might change things. When we exert it, it might make those tough choices between individual or community or justice or mercy or loyalty or truth or short versus long term thinking. When we exert our real power, guess what? There's cause and effect there. You exert power in the world, then things change and you worry, can I handle it? And what I love to tell people is like, don't worry if you can handle it. Like what? I'm like, I never worry if I can handle it because my dominant mode in my brain isn't. I have to go handle it perfectly. My dominant mode, thank God, is the growth mindset that says, I'm gonna go learn. I trust in learning, and I'm not even a good learner. For those who don't know me that well, it takes me a few times, I'm from Montana. You gotta smack me in the head a few times, like, okay, oh, yeah, okay, I got that right. Ask my wife. It takes a few reps over here for me to kind of get it. That it's like. But I just trust. I just trust. I'll learn, I'll figure it out, it'll be okay. And if I can't figure it out, I'll find someone who can figure it out, who can mentor me, who can teach me. The fear of responsibility isn't even my bones. I'm like, I can kind of handle anything. Maybe I don't get it right right away, but over a period of time, with enough time, energy, trust, training, mentorship, discipline, good habits, I'll figure it out or I'll find somebody who can. That trust has allowed me to stop certain things in my life that even seemed right. One stage of my career as an example, to elevate to another stage of my career was a scary thing. I could go, oh, that's going to ruin my reputation if this doesn't go well. Oh, my old audience might not like it if I try this new thing. Oh, you know, if I do this, these people might reject me or, oh my gosh, this is going to be harder. I might not be able to handle it. None of that happened because I was aware that that is what we all go through. Your worry. And that fear of regret or rejection or ruin or responsibility, it's just a mind game, isn't it? It's just thoughts. It's just how you determine to perceive it. And that's the beauty of all this. Because then once you can get over that, you come right back over to here and just go, okay, where am I coming from? Is this going to be a strategic good decision in my life or am I going to operate off fear and discouragement? Hey, it's Brendan. Thanks for watching this video. Please enjoy all the other videos on my channel and listen if you would love to have a daily, exclusive life coaching audio for me. Make sure you go get signed up for Growth Day. 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