Fear and Motivation–Part II: Overcoming Personal Fears

I am firmly in the camp that fear is a poor motivator, but overcoming a personal fear is a huge motivator for me.  In my thirties I conquered my fear of public speaking and my fear of skiing…I’d have to re-conquer them if it came right down to it, but now I know I could.

Fear of public speaking is fairly common; according to the website, Glossophobia (yes, there’s an official term for fear of speaking!), as many as 75% of people suffer from glossophobia. I had a job for a few years where I was teaching lean manufacturing techniques. I had to regularly get up in front of groups of strangers and keep their interest as I taught them the basics to get them started on a project. At first, I couldn’t sleep well the night before, knowing I had to be knowledgeable and entertaining about something that was new to me. As I got more and more practiced at it though, it got easier. The more workshops I conducted, the more of my own stories I had to share to illustrate my training.

I worked through my fear and came out knowing that I could speak in front of strangers. Then I was asked by my company to give a presentation about my work and I had to speak in front of not a dozen people, but hundreds of people…and these were people that potentially held my career in their hands! I walked out on stage and walked through my lean manufacturing example. I took questions from the audience, and I survived! The biggest thing I learned is that the more knowledgeable I was about a subject, the more quickly I could relax on stage and get into the flow of my presentation.

I don’t know of a specific term related to the fear of skiing, but fear of dying is really the bottom line! I didn’t start out with a fear of skiing, but my first time down the slopes in Colorado was terrifying. I’d skied a little in my middle school ski club, but only in the Midwest where the hills were small and the top layer of snow was icy, crunchy bits that flew out of a snow-making machine. It was always cold at ski club, in the early darkness after school, and I gave it up after the first year because I just didn’t enjoy it. Years later, my sister invited us to Colorado to go skiing and I was excited about the idea of taking lessons and giving it a try.

I worked on the training hill with my instructor and learned all the basics. By afternoon, I was up on the mountain. It was so beautiful and so scary! I started down the trail and soon picked up a lot of speed and was heading for what looked like a cliff. I veered at the last minute and was able to slow down a bit. Within minutes I had the same problem, only I was going faster still. I rolled back and executed a planned fall…not too gracefully. I wasn’t too graceful getting back up again either! I still had a long way to go and started down the mountain again. A third time I found myself flying toward the edge of the trail and fell to keep from going over the edge. By that time, I was ready to give up and hike down the mountain. Then, I remembered my instructor saying, “The most important thing to remember is to stay in control…it doesn’t matter how fast or slow you ski, just that you are always in control”. This time, I got up and started across the slope, making my way down in big, loopy curves. I even did some nice parallel turns and I got all the way down, always in control.

In both these cases, I was afraid of something but I chose to push through my fear and conquer it. It was exhilarating and powerful. Now I am trying to do the same thing by challenging myself to conquer other fears. I can’t say that facing a fear motivates me, but conquering one does wonders! So, onward on my November challenges to get my novel out of my head and onto “paper” and to complete a 5k.

Find the Joy in the Journey…even when you have to face your fears to do it!

Related Posts:

Fear and Motivation-Part I: It’s a Bad Boss Who Tries to Motivate with Fear

Fear and Motivation–Part III: The Spiders and the Barracuda