We fear loss, the unknown, risk, events that resemble hardships of the past, and even fear itself. Fear when based in facts or reasonable hunches is a gift meant to trigger a response to remove yourself from the source of the fear. Fear not based in fact or from faulty assumptions is unproductive, and way too common. Let me illustrate with a short example.
Vick is trying to influence 3 colleagues from other parts of his company to cooperate with his project plan. As Vick starts his pitch something reminds him of a time when he was under prepared and hit a wall with his pitch. Vick notices in the first few minutes his colleague check her watch, and thinks ‘she’s disinterested, I better pick up the pace’. One of the colleagues says, “Vick, we have other priorities that we are dealing with, and even though we agree with your initiative, we can’t commit now.” Vick thinks, Why am I here? I can’t wait until this is over. Vick feels the rise of heat along my spine and thinks now they know I’m uncomfortable. I need to end this. Vick says, “You have the main points of my plan and I hope we can count on your support. If you are interested, maybe we can pick this up when you have the time.” They agree that we should meet again in a month or so, hands are shook, and Vick is on his way. What happened here? Was there a moment Vick missed the opportunity to intervene?
You get the point that in this case there was nothing to fear but once it was triggered downward it spiraled without interruption. Vick didn’t allow himself to be influential, results suffered and he encouraged an irrational fear. Let’s examine what’s going on and how Vick could change this unproductive drama.
First an ongoing state of awareness is required that notices signals that your mind is pairing to the past. Picking up cues of fear, must be early in the cycle to be effective. A cue can be heat at the back of your neck, a thought, accelerating heart-rate, perspiration, quickening speech pace, etc. The point is to know your cues and to be on the lookout for them.
Awareness and recognizing cues is not enough, you need an intervention, something that you can invoke in seconds that reduces the fear and avoids the start of a downward spiral. Your intervention needs to work for you. Options:
- Consider a successful situation in the past and how it felt and tell yourself the same is possible here.
- Look at the source of fear as a puzzle rather than something to fear, or in other words, what shift can I make that can improve my communication at this moment?
- How can I use the power of listening versus talking nervously, or what question can I ask that will help determine the other parties intent?
- How can I re-frame this situation to play to my strengths? This can be done by shifting from problem to vision or strategy to tactics or elevating the scope of your focus.
- A mantra that calms you, like ‘keep moving and until it becomes easy.’
- Invoke body movement that allows you to collect your thoughts, or poise like standing, leaning forward with a big smile, or summarizing on a flipchart.
There are as many interventions as there are people and fears. The point is to have one in mind and invoke it at the first sign of unease before your behavior makes it harder to recover.
With a strategy to countering unnecessary fear we can optimize our career. You know when you are in the zone this way because you are moving toward your goals, experiencing new situations and surprising yourself with the support from others.
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