Do One Thing Every Day That Scares You (How to overcome our fears)

 ​When we are anxious, we interpret certain events as a threat, whether they are or not. We over-estimate the likelihood of what is in fact an unlikely event and under-estimate our ability to cope if that difficult event occurred.

​When we are in a state of anxiety we continually insist in focussing on the more negative possibilities. This is pointless and will only make your anxiety worse.

​You are likely to tell yourself you can't cope, despite past evidence to the contrary, having coped with all the setbacks in your life so far without disintegrating!

​Look at some of your irrational beliefs e.g.:

·       ​"I must not mess up or I won't be able to cope"

·       ​"If this is less than 100% it will be imperfect and will prove that I'm a failure"

·       ​"If I don't do this on time it will be a disaster"

​Are any of the above true? Where will thinking this way get you?

​Given that the evidence does not support any of your hypotheses, ask yourself Instead, are there other possibilities I can think of? Be realistic. What is a more realistic thought?

​Repeat the more realistic thought as often as you need to in order to reinforce it. Is this helpful? What behaviour could you replace it with (do so forcefully and empathetically and repeatedly).

Irrational thinking can be difficult to identify, so it takes practice, but doing so will enable us to challenge anxious thoughts, and instead choose helpful, realistic thoughts that are accurate. As a consequence, we will improve our ability to cope with every adversity.

“In life’s steeplechase one must always jump the fence when it comes.”

- Winston Churchill