The Other Side of Fear

“Everything you’ve ever wanted 

is on the other side of fear.” 

~ George Addair ~

November 2011.  I parked my car in an unfamiliar parking lot and walked into an unfamiliar building.  I walked into a meeting room full of people I had never met and heard Robert Granger introduce me to those gathered as the new Administrator of The Bradley Center.  No one seemed very impressed.  And, frankly, I wasn’t very impressed either.  Robert had told me The Bradley Center had lost money for the prior 6 years.  The census was in the 20’s.  There seemed a lack of enthusiasm and perhaps some nervousness about what was going to happen next. FEAR. No one gathered that day knew what changes were ahead…including me.  And I couldn’t help but think of what my old mentor, Bill Morrison, had told me early in my career:  Anytime a major change happens in your hospital, your staff and doctors will have 3 questions and, interestingly, they are always the same 3 questions:  (1) “What about me?”, (2) “What about me?”, and (3) “Oh, by the way, what about me?” Fear.

To combat fear, action is the greatest antidote – to depression, fear and anxiety. Action. The reason I reject fear is because it undermines the capacity to act. The moment you’re engaged in deliberate action – well, thought-out action that is likely to be effective – all fear goes away.  Fear is a paralyzing emotion that has an element of irrationality about it. It’s because you’re confronted with challenges or tasks that you don’t know how to cope with because the outcome is uncertain.  And yet, as George Addair said, “Everything you’re ever wanted is on the other side of fear.”  

In my life, I’ve lost jobs three or four times. And I’m better for it. Life is full of gray. It’s not black or white; it’s a fact:  There are no guarantees. You just have to realize that things will continually change and life demands that you change, too.  In graduate school, I wrote an article for the Journal of Irreproducible Results titled “The (R)Evolutionary Model:  Adapt, Migrate, Mutate or Die.”  I argued that when things change, you really only have four options:  You can adapt by embracing the change, you can move on by migration, you can change radically by mutating into a different type of person or you can “die” figuratively by getting stuck in place by fear, anxiety and depression.