Let’s talk about self imposed goals, control and fear

Introduction

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During the last few years and even decades, the pace of life in our society has accelerated in a considerable way mostly thanks to technology, so much so that it could be said that the general intention for people consists on achieving all kinds of goals immediately, whether they are material goals or something more personal. Our need for immediate results is stronger than ever before.

Instant gratification is the desire to experience pleasure or fulfillment without delay or deferment. Basically, it’s when you want it; and you want it now. | Source

At first sight, this significant level of motivation can be seem as something that can allow us to achieve a greater well being through specific accomplishments like a better job, or a good loving relationship with the partner, an active social live, among other things we all enjoy. However, if the person forgets about the necessary balance between this motivation and the excess of self demands, all of this can lead to an opposite effect, such as fears and continuing worries.

We could say there is a link between the manifestation of fear or anguish in people with the lack of control over their lives, or the lack of results when it comes to their goals. Perhaps on a social level, people have internalized the obligation to reach every single one of the proposed goals, as well as the obligation to not fail in any of the projects or businesses.

Is fear something good?

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This questions could be approached using several perspectives actually. Fear, in its most basic sense, is clearly something good and necessary to have.

Fear is a vital response to physical and emotional danger — if we didn't feel it, we couldn't protect ourselves from legitimate threats. But often we fear situations that are far from life-or-death, and thus hang back for no good reason. Traumas or bad experiences can trigger a fear response within us that is hard to quell. Yet exposing ourselves to our personal demons is the best way to move past them. | Source
the unpleasant emotional state consisting of psychological and psychophysiological responses to a real external threat or danger. | Source

Fear is then, one of primary emotions most necessary for survival, therefore highly functional. In the past, this reaction allowed the escape of wild creatures activating the organism to start running as fast as possible.

Today, even though we are no longer living in a primitive environment, we still need a kind of warning system to identify potential dangers as a mechanism to protect ourselves. Thus, the emotion of fear must be understood as something completely natural. What is truly relevant, the key point about this subject and where we should put our focus, is in the handling of that reaction and how the fear is managed.

When it comes to having control as a way of coping with concerns, it is relatively easy to have it over objects and things, but it is not as simple to carry out the same control when other people are involved, as, for example, with the case of social relations.

Though it is irrevocably true that people can control themselves, there is far more in life there is no control over (despite best attempts). | Source

When the rest of people in our social circles do not respond as we would expect, we can have among other emotions, a reaction consisting in fear and insecurity. This, can lead to the development of a lack of trust that is able to one way or another condition the developing of new social relationships.

Due to this, such a person might end up adopting that lack of trust as an excuse to retreat when something uncomfortable or painful is happening, without caring for the growing emotional distance with his social environment.

Fear and control

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Having a certain level of control can be helpful because preserving a proper order in the different areas of our life makes it possible to increase and maintain self confidence.

The feeling of being in control can cause a sense of security, since it can easily make any person feel a lot of comfort. However, this should all be in a balanced way because otherwise the individual will have the need to control more things in order to not lose that comfort, and might start to be immersed in an endless and infinite escalation of sources of concern that will require immediate control.

From an evolutionary standpoint, if we are in control of our environment, then we have a far better chance of survival. Our deep subconscious mind thus gives us strong biochemical prods when we face some kind of danger. | Source

It seems clear to think that the bigger the desire for security, the bigger the fear for its loss. Thus, uncertainty which is the difference between expectation and truth, stops being tolerable and becomes something to be avoided at all costs. The problem with this, lies in the impossibility of eliminating uncertainty in general, because it is something intrinsic to the future.

In the end, the person would have to choose between 2 alternatives which are comfort or overcoming the fears and concerns.

The first option can be mentally reliving, since it avoids those unpleasant sensations such as fear or discomfort. However, choosing this in the long term leads to complications in the future, because there won’t be any opportunity to develop proper mental strength. On the other hand, the second option even if it might be more complex to put into practice, it could have the final result of eventually stopping the tendency of feeling fear or anxiety where there is no proper control.

Of course, in order to achieve the goal of overcoming those issues, important changes will need to happen in relation to the thought patterns of the person and the mindset regarding the source of such fear, that would have to be modified as well.

there is a classification of fears of professor Yu. V. Shcherbatykh. It divides all fears into three main groups. Biological fears are directly connected with threat of human life (for example, fear of the fire). Social fears are connected with fear of change of the social status (fear of loss of work, fear of public statements). At last, existential fears are connected with the essence of the person (fear of death, fear of the opened and closed space, fear of height). | Source

All of those fears have in common that they have an object that they refer to, an object that is known and that we fear losing it, whether it is a relationship with our partner (regardless of whether it is satisfactory or not), the preservation of life in the event of a dangerous accident or any other circumstance that could endanger everything that is important for us.

Taking action and defeating the insecurity in us

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If the experience of fear is inescapable, how do we work with it? One possible way to overcome fear is to study fear, in ourselves and others, become familiar with it and understand it better. Diving into fear is contrary to our habitual reaction, which is to push away or deny what frightens us, but getting to know our fears might actually soften or even incapacitate them. | Source

Although it seems an obvious fact, one of the main obstacles that must be handled by the person is to finally manage to be brave enough to face their own fears. It may be the case, however, that this person prefers to keep himself in a save place away from any uncomfortable circumstance, getting short term relax but long term weakness and vulnerability.

The decision between taking the path between security and the absence of fear is one of the most difficult and determining barriers that must be overcome.

Another important aspect that must be carried out is about learning to identify what kind of fear is present and what could be the function they are fulfilling in the life of the person in question. The fact of getting such fear to stop being functional would be an important achievement in order to eventually leave it behind.

The belief that we can have everything under control is nothing more than an illusion built in our minds to make us feel serenity, it is only a belief, not a reality, and that can cause frustration.

However, this has the advantage that, being something developed by the own person, it could be dismantled in the same way as it was created. However, the fact that this belief was created precisely by the person itself, might cause its elimination to be more challenging because the person can become very fond of his own beliefs.

Conclusion

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It is necessary to embrace tolerance to the unknown, understanding it as something natural and intrinsic to life in general, making discoveries always require encountering unknown things, to then begin the process to understand what was discovered. For this reason, uncertainty shouldn’t always be seen as something negative.

Besides, we are all humans after all and the acceptance of oneself as a being that can make mistakes, becomes another of the core beliefs that must can improve everything that has been mentioned in this article.

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