Once you have begun to accept your fears, discovered their sources and started practicing different strategies and techniques to help yourself think more positively on the journey to being fearless, you’ll also need to begin to challenge yourself.
Challenging yourself doesn’t mean that you’ll need to immediately walk straight into a situation that is terrifying for you – in fact, quite the opposite. Learning to effectively challenge yourself to do something should begin with challenges that you’re not afraid of taking on, and slowly work yourself up to a level where you are comfortable challenging yourself to face your fears.
The Meditation Challenge
First of all, you should challenge yourself to take steps to improve your life and well-being as a whole.
Challenging yourself to take part in activities which will reduce stress and encourage positivity is a great start, as there’s nothing to be fearful of and doing so will actually help you to be in the best position to eventually conquer your fears.
The first challenge that you should be facing is ‘The Meditation Challenge’. Daily meditation is far from scary, in fact it is highly effective in helping to reduce stress, alleviate fear, and make you feel happier and healthier overall.
When you meditate, you learn to become more connected to everything around you, and in turn you’ll be less fearful of the things that you face in your everyday life.
This challenge is an awesome one to start with, as you’ll be able to prove to yourself that you can do whatever you set your mind to. The positive benefits which you will experience when you practice daily meditation will definitely make the challenge worthwhile, leaving you wondering what you’re missing out on by not challenging yourself to do other things as well.
Working Up to Bigger Challenges
Once you have challenged yourself to practice daily meditation and have seen the benefits, you’ll most likely be wondering what else you can challenge yourself to do that will also improve your life.
New challenges should be entirely up to you – but remember to work yourself up to the risky challenges gradually, and begin by challenging yourself to do things that you’re not terrified of.
Challenging yourself to conquer the smaller anxieties or fears that don’t necessarily render you shivering and quaking is a great idea. For example, if you’re planning to get fit but are anxious about visiting the gym (but not to a point where it is taking over your life), challenge yourself to take a class, or even have a one to one with a personal trainer.
Gradually, challenge yourself to do more and more until you are confidently working out regularly. This can work for any situations or activities which trigger a little anxiety or worry.
Tackling your smaller, not-so-significant fears first enables you to lay the foundations and build up the confidence that you need to take on and conquer your bigger fears which hold you back.
Challenging Yourself to Take Risks
You should only challenge yourself to take risks by entering into situations that you would normally find trigger fear when you feel fully prepared. Throwing yourself into a fearful situation head-first when you’re not ready could have serious repercussions.
Before you start to think about tackling the bigger challenges, you’ll need to ensure that you have taken all the necessary steps to fully prepare your-self. By now, you should have determined the source of your fear, accepted your fears, and trained your mind to switch negative thoughts for positive ones.
You should also have participated in the relevant therapies such as talking therapy, image therapy, and meditation to give you the motivation and calm that you need to tackle the biggest challenges of all – facing your fears.
If you are sure that you are ready, you can begin by setting yourself small challenges to help ease yourself into tackling your fears. You should always remember that if you begin to feel overwhelmed or the fear takes over, the best thing to do is to remove yourself from the situation and take a deep breath.
Doing this doesn’t mean that you’ve failed – in fact, it’s the complete opposite – by removing yourself from the situation, you’ve regained control over your emotions and given yourself the time that you need to get your composure back.
Once you feel ready to try a second time, you can take the risk again. This type of method will ensure that the physical symptoms of fear don’t begin to get to you. If you start to feel any physical symptoms such as nausea, shaking or sweating then get out of there, and try again later.
Examples
Everybody has different fears, so there’s no one-size-fits-all example of how to challenge yourself to face your fears. But let’s look at some examples of how to face common fears that you may or may not experience.
If you’re scared of flying, for instance, don’t challenge yourself by booking a long-haul flight half way across the world. Instead, book a short, national flight to another city in your country – an area which you can return home from by another method of transportation if you don’t feel ready to go up in the air again.
As you begin to feel more confident, you can increase the lengths of the flights you book until you’re ready to take the long-haul flight to the destination that you’ve always dreamed of visiting.
Here’s another example – you’re scared of dogs. So, don’t force yourself to go and pet an extremely angry-looking guard dog who’s growling at you.
Cuddle a cute, harmless puppy instead! As your fears begin to alleviate, you can challenge yourself to approach bigger dogs – with the owner’s permission of course.
Last example – if you’re afraid of water, don’t challenge yourself to dive straight into the deep end of the pool. Chances are that you’ll just begin to panic, and you’ll go straight back to square one.
Instead, take baby steps. Take up swimming lessons with a qualified instructor who will look after you, and stick to shallow water where you’re not in any danger. Each time you visit, challenge yourself to swim out a little further. If you have to wear armbands for support, then wear them and rock them!
Remember to embrace whatever it takes to help you face your fears.
By the time you have worked on your mindset to transform it in to the best ever for fear-conquering, you’ll be feeling a lot more confident in yourself to tackle your fears head-on and stop them from taking over your life for once and for all.
But, the trick is not to get overly confident – taking on too big a challenge at the wrong time could do nothing but set you back. The best way to approach facing your fears and challenging yourself to take risks is to do it one step at a time.
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