Identifying Fear & Learning to Sit with It.
Like my height, I can’t control feeling fear or anxiety but a practice of laughing at a fear of being sub-optimal has helped.
Loneliness
I asked my partner what she thought my greatest fear was. It was meant to be one of those fun ‘do you know your partner’ relationship questions. I was searching for an answer in my mind when she stared into my thinly visible eye sockets and she said “loneliness”.
No smiles. Boy, that was deep.
It truly is a silly question. “Greatest fear”… as if there is one thing that trumps all. If I’m on top of the empire state building, heights will be my fear and at the dinner table it will be the sight of broccoli and in a dark alleyway, it will be some serial killer who performs long torture sessions.
I am afraid of many things. But what my partner said made me think about it a little more.
It instinctively brought on the idea of “sitting with the fear” as it propelled me to write this essay amidst a prolonged period of feeling relative peace of mind. A rarity in the last few years.
Desire Mistaken as Fear
I know loneliness is something I’m uncomfortable with. But it made me think whether it was something I was afraid of or if it was a manifestation of desiring the opposite of loneliness.
The desire for any kind of external indication to be seen, recognized, unforgotten… to matter.
I don’t think I’m alone in this as I don’t think I’m the only one that gets upset learning I wasn’t invited to a hangout or some trip.
It’s something I realized was a major source of stress for me growing up. I felt it to be one of the primary drivers for my over-achievement. I think this was a driving factor in the pursuit to win as many awards as I could in high school. To leave a mark in the school like a dog does to a tree. A desire to be seen. One could even say that my essays are an offshoot of a desire to be understood by people and to be seen “properly”.
Though I relish in deep, intimate conversation with strangers, this desire has also made me wonder whether my extroversion is further affected by the desire, which might stem from insecurity: to be seen.
The general theme for my life has been about challenging conventions. It’s tended to result in “highs”. The typical “chip on the shoulder, so I’m going to prove you wrong” complex. One could go as far as to sum up my consulting career as one spent doing everything people said can’t be done.
The fickleness of the kind of career is the long crashes that come. Whether it’s getting on a super cool project or getting promoted without following the rules of the ‘game’…. Everything subsequent becomes boring.
It’s made me wonder if that’s been the reason for my attraction to investing as well. The fact that your entire job is about making money by challenging conventions. In such a process, you will be seen for doing well.
This train of thought led to asking: If a discomfort with loneliness was masking a desire to be seen…. What was the other side of that coin? What was bringing about a desire to be seen? Was there something else that took priority? That drove feelings of anxiety… anger… and depression?
Fear Underlying the Desire.
Like a snake in a cave… the thought slithered out from the depth of my mind: The sub-optimal use of time.
It’s ridiculous, isn’t it?
As I write this down, I realize how foolish it is. It felt embarrassingly laughable as I thought about it. But that made it feel all the truer.
Once again, I do not think I’m alone in feeling this. I think anyone who is systematically-oriented suffers from fear and dislike for sub-optimal systems. But I think I can even push this to others in the form of fearing regret. Regretting making the “wrong” decision with the benefit hindsight.
When I think about the feelings of anxiety, depression, and anger… why they are ignited and what brings them about… it’s from the perpetual fear of whether I’m wasting my time. Fears that ignite the negative emotions related to missed opportunities from the past due to laziness, lack of information (as if I would’ve made a better decision with more information), underestimating the world…. You get the picture.
Looking Deeper.
What was driving this anguish to be efficient and effective? Why was it so upsetting for me? Why did it nag at me that the path I embarked on appeared sub-optimal? Why did I feel this pressure for speed and results in careers, investments, and relationships?
I’m hyper curious and want to do so many things but it wasn’t about the excitement to do more. Rather, blaming the sub-optimal system for not allowing me to do more. But who said this path was sub-optimal? What makes me think this path is sub-optimal?
It’s when I compare it to what someone else did. Only when I compare it to all the options that are out there. With the benefit of hindsight, I know what the optimal route could have been. But alas, the truly optimal only exists in a world of complete information. With a full grasp of all information present, past, and future.
In the present, with no information about the future, every decision I make would have to be considered optimal. Assuming that I believe myself to be prudent, hard-working, and diligent (which I do on most days) then I made every decision with the intention of it being optimal.
Sitting With It.
You may read this and go, “God how self-destructive..” And even think of floating an opinion/comment of “You shouldn’t think like that.”
But when you go through something similar yourself and your friend tells you to look at it objectively and scoffs at how ridiculous you are, the typical response is “Easy for you to say, you have no idea!”
Thus is the journey of sitting with fear. The world is limited by people who know to listen and keep their unsolicited advice to themselves. What the world is also limited with is the understanding that fear and all its cronies (i.e. anger, depression, anxiety) are all-natural and normal.
It’s like if someone tried telling me “Hey Dan, it sucks being short… you should try growing taller.” Somethings are just how nature has decided as fit and you can’t do anything but accept it, sit with it and deal with it.
As I write this essay and try to look at it objectively though, it’s ridiculous. It truly is funny how this fear can be so debilitating for me. And therein lies the practice to laugh at yourself. To not take yourself so seriously. Sincerely, yes. But not seriously.
My Practice.
As I’ve implied before, there is no ‘wasted’ time. Every moment was optimal at that present and if I see how something could’ve been more optimal, it’s only thanks to having taken that sub-optimal journey. Without the journey, none of the mistakes would’ve been made.
And so, one could think the practice to handle the anxiety, anger, and depression, when it appears, is to talk sense into it by reminding myself of this fact. Oh but it just doesn’t seem to be that easy at times.
It seems that everyone has their practice and I’ve sought out to find mine over the years. I’ve found meditating to be quite helpful for anger. But, despite all the “top performers” swearing by meditation… I’ve moved on to find a different method.
I want to caveat once again by saying, I don’t know how to deal with fear and the impending negative emotions you feel related to it. Well, I don’t know of a guaranteed 100% cure. That’s why I’m approaching it as a practice because I think the methods I use will evolve as I evolve.
What I’ve found to be helpful lately has been to unload these feelings on my morning journal and using writing as a way of sitting with it. To talk to myself on the page and use that as a way of reminding myself how foolish it appears to my objective self. How my fear is a false dichotomy because one cannot be sub-optimal in the present without admitting you are being lazy and careless.
Sometimes, I remind myself to stop by looking at a sticker I made. A sticker that says “Stop, Observe… See” on my laptop. It’s placed on the left lower side so I can see it from the corner of my eye. It grants me enough time to just pause. To pause and remind myself how silly it is to be so sub-optimal.
It’s similar to how Elon Musk stopped being afraid of the dark by reminding himself he was being afraid of electrons and protons (something like that… I’m butchering the science piece but making a point about the objective part).
I know I’m afraid of being sub-optimal. It sucks when those thoughts come into my mind. It sucks when they stress me out. But that is life. So I have a practice for dealing with it. Just like how I walk under branches to remind myself I never have to worry about getting hit by a branch… like tall people do.
Disclaimer - I’m writing this for myself. For my past, present and future self. Much of what I write is my opinion. If it somehow ignites agreement in you then great, I’d love to hear about it. If it sparks disagreement in you, don’t reach out because I don’t care for it. There always are obvious exceptions and the flawed person in me hasn’t considered them all.