The 8 habits to know how to face fears

Fear is one of the most adaptive human emotions that exist, and throughout history they have served us well. to deal with the threats and risks that arise both in the natural environment and in interaction with the rest.

However, today there are many people who live daily with limiting fears of all kinds; fears that prevent them from living the life they would like or achieving their goals both personally and professionally.

These fears can be more or less real, such as fear of losing your job, a family member getting sick, or being rejected by our partner, or less founded as the fear of the dark, certain animals or to go in airplane. In any case, if we do not learn to manage this emotion well, it can lead us to enter a vicious circle of avoidance and renunciation.

• Related article: "Types of stress and their triggers"

What are the main habits that help us to face fears?

If you want to successfully overcome your fears and want to know the main habits to do them, keep reading; Here you can consult our specialized selection of the most useful habits that we can apply to face any type of fear.

1. Gradual exposure to fear

Exposing yourself to the source of our fear is one of the most useful ways to deal with it and has been for decades. one of the main techniques used by the principals of psychology to treat all kinds of fears or phobias.

Exposure to the fear-generating source should be gradual and go from the easiest and simplest approaches to the most complex., ensuring that the person is not too affected psychologically.

In fact, if a person has social phobia or extreme agoraphobia, for example, he can begin to overcome his fears by going to psychotherapy and going through a program of exposure to what is happening to him. generates that emotional reaction (with professional support) leaving the house until reaching the street door and the next day until turning the first corner of a building, like this successively.

• You may be interested: "Exposure therapy with response prevention: what it is and how it is used"

2. communicate our fears

A good way to overcome any type of problem or psychological discomfort that we may have is to communicate our situation to family or friends around us who care about us.

Verbalizing one's own fears and concerns that haunt us to another person who offers us their unconditional listening and understanding has a very positive effect on the person who suffers.

In the same way, by communicating our fears to another person, we can obtain advice or solutions that we did not have before, that can help us. overcome the problem and, in general, will help us feel more supported and therefore better equipped to face those fears irrational.

3. Keep an emotion diary

As happens with verbal expression, written expression is another of the ways that people have of communicate what we feel at a given moment, and it is an activity that is highly valued for its therapeutic usefulness, that is effective in developing self-awareness and know how to distinguish between the emotions and feelings that we usually feel, and understand what experiences elicit them.

Writing a diary during the week about the emotions we experience at each moment is one of the best ways to know ourselves and understand our fears, by putting in order our ideas about what happens to us through the head.

4. Healthy habits

Leading a healthy life is one of the best strategies we can follow to increase our self-esteem and gradually lose those irrational fears that condition our daily lives. If we are physically well, we also feel less vulnerable psychologically.

There are a wide variety of habits that increase both our physical and mental health, among the most important we can find: exercise weekly, sleep enough hours, eat healthy and maintain an active affective-social life.

• You may be interested: "Insomnia: what is it and how it impacts our health"

5. Identify maladaptive thoughts

Another of the strategies that we can follow to learn to successfully face our fears is to detect those trap thoughts that we often use as an excuse to face any type of fear.

Knowing the intellectual mechanisms that prevent us from overcoming our fears is the first step to begin the path that will allow us to face them successfully.

6. Learn relaxation techniques

Both medicine and psychology have demonstrated the usefulness of the habitual practice of relaxation techniques such as meditation or diaphragmatic breathing in overcoming all kinds of problems and psychological disorders.

The integration in our day to day of this type of techniques can help us to reduce the levels of stress, anxiety or fear generated by any given source, and also helps us to focus our attention, get to know each other better and increase the quality of life.

• Related article: "6 easy relaxation techniques to combat stress"

7. know ourselves

Self-knowledge is essential when overcoming a problem in any area of ​​a person's life, and As indicated above, there are many strategies that we can follow to improve our self-knowledge.

In addition to meditating, practicing relaxation techniques, communicating with other people or writing a diary, there are other exercises to get to know ourselves better, such as the establish our strengths and weaknesses or talk to friends and family about our strengths and weaknesses.

8. go to the psychologist

Psychology professionals recommend going to a psychological consultation when a person's situation is unsustainable and their fear prevents them from living normally on a day-to-day basis.

A psychologist specialized in fears or phobias is the best professional to help us overcome our fear, and he is the one who knows exactly what strategies we must follow to achieve it and what techniques are the most recommended for our case.

• You may be interested: "The 10 benefits of going to psychological therapy"

Looking for psychological support?

If you are looking for psychotherapy services, contact us.

In PSiCOBAi we serve people of all ages; You will find us in our center located in Majadahonda.