The Fear Of Making The Wrong Choices

Fear, it’s a nasty word and an even nastier emotion. It keeps us caught in small boxes and from showing up to our present life, future, relationships, jobs, families, you name it. If fear is present, you are not thriving to your fullest potential.

That’s why you and I are taking one-on-one deep dive into the fear of making the wrong choice! Fear is the biggest enemy to your decision-making, and it can hold you captive. So, if you have ever found yourself uncertain, feeling “stuck,” unable to move forward, or wishing someone else could choose for you, this is the conversation for you!

So, let’s dive right in.

Transcript

Have you ever thought about how many choices you actually make,

Big or small,

Every single day?

How about every week?

How about how many decisions you make in a single month?

Or six months?

Or how about a year?

Okay,

I'll stop.

I can actually feel the anxiety building out of a few of you right now.

It's okay.

Take a deep breath.

Everything is fine.

Even saying the word choice or decision makes fear and anxiety rise in some people.

It's just a natural response.

Yet,

If you think about it,

We all know that we will experience times in our lives where we are forced to make decisions.

I'm not talking about the little daily decisions.

I'm talking about big decisions,

All-encompassing decisions that cause us to fear,

To ruminate,

To question.

We all have these moments.

And of course,

Some decisions are more important than others.

And we all know that one choice can absolutely change the trajectory of your life.

And that's exactly why fear comes into play.

But regardless of how monumental one choice can be,

Fear,

Again,

Is the biggest enemy to your decision-making.

So often,

We find ourselves in uncertainty,

And we label that horrible word on our lives,

Stuck.

I'm stuck.

I don't know how.

This is too big for me.

And when we say those words,

When we get into those moments,

We become paralyzed in making decisions that work for us because we're afraid of making the wrong decision.

I can actually tell if someone has this within their mindset,

Within their daily operation,

Based on the language that they use.

The biggest catchphrase.

And ask yourself right now if you have this present,

Because if you do,

You are afraid of decision-making,

Even at the lowest level.

And that catchphrase is,

I don't know.

We say this because we don't want to answer the wrong thing.

We don't want to use the wrong words.

Yet here's the truth.

If you learn nothing else,

If you learn nothing else,

Let it be this today.

I often will say that to you.

Here's the big aha.

Without deliberate decisions in your life,

You cannot make deliberate change.

Let me say that again.

Without deliberate decisions in your life,

You cannot make deliberate change.

Simply put,

If you want to make progress,

You have to be able to make progress.

You can't progress in the manner in which you want if you refuse to make a decision,

Make a choice.

With all of that said,

Let's talk about the purpose of this conversation today.

I can't tell you how many times women sit in front of me day after day,

Knowing that they want different lives,

Different relationships,

Different jobs to change their past,

To do whatever it is that is weighing on them.

But they are scared as hell to dive in,

To make a decision,

And put their feelings,

Thoughts,

And actions to test.

And I get it.

Doing so means that we have to be uncomfortable,

And that is difficult.

But you have to be willing to look at your life from 30,

000 feet above and say,

You know what?

Is this fear making me so uncomfortable that I want to stay in it?

Or is this fear making me so uncomfortable that I want to move from it?

Right?

Those are the two choices.

So what do you want to do with the fear,

With the decisions,

With this place of I don't know?

I hope you're saying to yourself,

I don't want to be in that space.

I want to get out of that space.

How do we do it?

Let's talk about what fear is.

The difference of really being able to look at the levels of our decision making.

Let's look at what causes us to have fear.

And then I'm going to hand you some tools so that you can get into your life and out of fear and into a place where you are making grounded,

Solid,

Empowered decisions.

And of course,

Like always,

Let's start with the definition of fear.

Fear is an emotion,

And it is a feeling.

If you're new around here to this podcast,

Listen to any of the emotional and feeling podcast,

Because I break down the difference.

We don't really have time to go into that today,

But I just want you to know that there is a difference.

So fear is the emotion and a feeling,

And it is unpleasant.

It's painful,

And it's strong.

It's caused by the anticipation,

Awareness,

Or the expectation of something bad happening or something that has happened,

And you're afraid it's going to repeat.

A lot of times we'll feel like there's danger or evil or pain that's present.

And I want you to remember that fear causes us to have anxiety.

And anxiety is nothing more than trying to gather all of the information,

Getting into our heads,

Ruminating,

Leaning into uncertainty,

And trying to find a solution.

We worry.

We have fear.

We're trying to get to point Z without ever starting at point A.

That's anxiety.

And while this definition is just okay,

It doesn't really tell us too much,

I want to put fear into perspective so that we can move through this understanding as we move through this journey today together.

And the only way to gain perspective is to have an understanding of it.

And so let's talk about the reality of fear for that understanding purpose.

And it's something that most people do not take into account because they don't realize that in order to understand fear,

You have to root down to what's really underlying,

To whatever the fundamental is of the situation or the experience that you're in,

Because the reality is that most things have a root cause.

So the reality of fear sounds and looks like you're not actually afraid of the dark.

You may think you are,

But you're scared of what's in the dark.

You're scared of the unknown.

You're not sure what you'll run into,

And that makes you fearful.

You're really not afraid to be loved,

But you may be afraid to be hurt or loved back.

You know,

What happened in your past?

What happened in the past relationship or as a child that made you feel that you could not trust love?

This is the root.

You see,

It's not the experience of being loved,

But it's the end result or the outcome of something from the past.

You're not afraid to let go.

Letting go is actually the easy part.

What you're afraid of is the reality and accepting it.

If I let go,

It means things change,

And I may not be ready for the change.

You're not really afraid of failure,

But what you are afraid of is being hurt by not meeting your own expectations.

Failure is temporary.

That feeling that you let yourself down may actually take some time to process.

And you may not really be afraid to be seen,

But you are afraid of judgment,

Because that has been present too.

This is the reality of fear.

It is a liar.

It tells us that we can't when we absolutely can.

It tells us that we're not good enough when that's not the truth.

It tries to weave its fingers into everything that is within our existence and muddy it up.

When I tell people this,

It's really funny to see their reaction.

Okay,

Funny is not really the right word.

You know what I mean.

It's like this massive aha moment.

It's that understanding that below the surface of everything you think,

Feel,

And connect with,

There's something else.

We have to drill down so that we are no longer making fearful choices or that we're holding ourselves on the sidelines of our lives because it's easier in the moment.

Because actually,

In the long run,

It is so detrimental.

We have to take action.

We have to make decisions.

So let's talk about some,

Not all,

We don't have time for that,

Of all of the big elements that cause us to fear making a decision,

Making a choice.

The first one,

It's the biggest one.

And it is the fear of decision-making because of an issue that stems from a traumatic event,

Something in your past.

When you suffer or you experience high levels of emotional pain,

You can absolutely have a hard time connecting to what you think is right for you.

For many,

The rule of thumb is this,

Because of the way we are wired.

The greater the experience,

The greater the path forward feels like it's covered in thorns and vines and ready to tie our ankles up and hold us in place.

The more we connect to something,

The harder the experience feels.

We struggle with making decisions when there's an impact outside of ourselves.

This is also another big reason.

If there's a significant other or a child or the situation impacts a group,

We may actually have more fear around that situation because again,

I don't want to make the wrong choice.

I'm okay with impacting myself a lot of times,

But I'm not okay with impacting the people I love or the people in my community.

We roll into this people-pleasing and the limits of limiting beliefs.

And we also really get into those stories that we've been taught or we've learned along our journey.

And we squish ourselves into small,

Small spaces in order to not have to make a decision that could go south.

Another reason comes down to when the situation is emotional,

Decision-making is just a harder process,

Period.

Why is that?

Well,

If the situation is big enough or trying enough to dysregulate us,

We actually lose our full capacity for rational thinking.

Our brain cannot handle all of those things at once.

This is why I often say,

Please practice the pause.

If you are making dysregulated decisions,

What do you think is going to occur?

I hope you're saying dysregulated outcomes because that's what's going to happen.

Other reasons could be there's a lack of trust,

Whether within ourselves,

The people involved,

Or the situation itself.

We feel out of control or lacking control.

If there's money or a heavy price to pay that's involved,

We will often hold ourselves from making the decision altogether.

Because again,

The risk and the reward seem really off balance.

We can hold ourselves back if we fear missing out.

When there's more work to do than we've been comfortable doing,

We can often hold ourselves in that decision paralysis as well.

There can even be triggers in the experience that is bringing you into a space of painful thinking,

And that can create powerlessness and lack.

There are so many heavy reasons as to why.

And regardless of the why,

It's important to remember what I said in the definition that fear is an emotion and a feeling.

If you are able to train your mind to accept how you feel,

Except that there's generally not a clear wrong or right to every situation,

And every situation has a root,

You can make changes.

And by changes,

I mean making a decision.

If you've spent a long time riding the emotional wave or you have heavy trauma,

You may need to come to terms with the fact that you rely on fear for growth.

You need chaos in order to feel better about what's happening.

Is that right?

No,

In the long run,

It will get you.

However,

That may just be your truth right now.

We don't have to remain in that truth,

But it could be your truth.

In fact,

My father comes to mind right now.

When I was younger,

My dad would tell me,

Just be average.

Get a C.

It's okay.

Buy the average car,

Buy the average house,

Live an average life.

Now,

That seems like really crazy advice.

I hear myself saying it now and I kind of giggle.

And the reason why is when I was younger,

That advice flew in the face of everything I saw around me.

I had high performing parents who were doing everything they could to make a life and grow within themselves and their businesses.

My dad was an entrepreneur,

A damn good one at that.

My stepmom had a career that she loved.

My mom went to law school when I was in middle school and high school.

Average was not within any experience that I had around me.

There was no way that I wanted to walk the path of a C or an average life.

No,

Thank you.

I wanted A's.

I wanted to prove myself.

I wanted to be above average.

And now we know why I was a people pleaser.

It's like I opened the door to people pleasing and I was like,

Hello,

Welcome.

Please make yourself at home.

No,

In all seriousness,

Though,

Average didn't make sense to me.

And I found myself ruminating on how to make choices,

How to get above where I was.

And honestly,

I totally missed my father's message.

He didn't mean for me to stay average.

He meant shoot for average and celebrate the hell out of clipping the norm.

Aiming for meteorocracy sometimes rather than shooting for the ultimate outcome allows us to get into a place where we're satisfying the need to make a decision.

We come to the place that average is okay if that's where we hit.

But we also allow ourselves to know that there are solutions within choice and we avoid overthinking.

And often we let go of that need to experience regret.

All of that is so necessary when we're living our daily lives.

And so we don't have to shoot for a sea life,

But we can really put ourselves there when the decisions are heavy,

But give ourselves the ability to take ourselves up to the next level.

That's really what my father meant.

That's the advice I'm handing to you today.

And in that,

Let's look at the different levels of decision making,

Because I believe this is the big missing part of the conversation when we talk about fear and how it's holding our tongue,

How it's holding our mindset,

And we feel stuck.

It's important to know that in the face of decisions,

Your mind is naturally going to enter a state of fight,

Flight,

Or freeze if we do not have good mechanisms,

Good tools to keep us not feeling unsafe.

Remember,

Danger doesn't have to be a physical threat.

Our mental processing and our emotional connection to the moment can bring us into fight,

Flight,

Or freeze,

Which of course makes every damn decision harder.

I'm going to give you five levels of decision making.

Now,

The goal is to be a level five thinker or decision maker the majority of the time.

Are you going to slip into the different levels depending on the circumstances?

Yes.

This idea,

This frame of thought is not about perfection.

It's about witnessing where you are and working through the moment to make it work for you.

Okay,

I want you to hear me on that.

I'm not asking you to be perfect.

I'm not asking you to be at level five all the time.

I'm asking you to witness the level in which you are at so that you can move through and make wise,

Firm decisions that are not based in fear.

So level one is freeze.

In some cases,

The fear of decision making is so overwhelming that it causes decision paralysis.

I've used those words before.

That's really where rumination and overthinking starts.

It's this,

I'm frozen in the situation and can't see any workable solutions to help me out.

That's what decision paralysis is.

Many times when people hit this level,

They are scared and they are numb,

And so they avoid decisions in their entirety.

We don't want you to stay in freeze.

This is a bad place to be,

And fear will always be king right here.

So level two is passive pleasing.

This is the space in decisions where you choose to please others rather than yourself.

It's about internalizing your feelings,

Numbing them down,

Sitting on them,

And passively pleasing the situation and others because it's easier than standing up for yourself.

It's easier than doing what you need or taking control of your life.

This may be okay on the outside for a little while,

But ultimately this builds anger and resentment within yourself,

And it builds anger and resentment towards other people.

It's here that we begin to feel taken advantage of or that we just don't matter.

And after a certain amount of time,

You will explode if you stay in level two decision making all the time.

Level three is really sitting in the middle.

This is exactly where I see most people when they come into my office where we first begin to work with each other is that I'm sitting in the middle.

They look at the situation and then they resort to staying in the center lane.

That means I'm going to wade through everything and sort of commit over here,

And then I'm going to move back over here.

Their choices don't feel fluid.

They feel like a very big tidal wave here,

There,

And all around.

In life,

You have to be more assertive so that you can stay on course.

Not saying that you have to make choices by force.

That's not it at all.

What I'm saying is you have to really look at what's important,

Make commitments,

And not ride that middle lane.

Waffling from one thing to another is not committing,

And it creates more confusion and chaos besides the fact that it's really damn exhausting.

Level four,

I just want to say a few minutes ago I said I want you at level five.

I also am completely fine with you staying in level four the majority of time.

This is assertive action.

Level four decision-making is when you know your beliefs,

You know what's important to you,

Your values are in check,

You know your why,

Where you stand,

And you have the ability to speak your mind.

Are you there?

Unless you've done a lot of therapy,

Unless you've done a lot of personal development,

Self-help,

You may not be because it's hard to stay in this space.

Even when speaking up may affect others at times,

What I want you to do is be able to make the right choices for you because that's the only way that you breed good outcomes.

Remember just a few minutes ago when I said without deliberate action and decisions in your life you cannot make deliberate change?

This is the second part of that.

Good decisions breed good outcomes.

Now,

Is that always true?

Not always.

We are human.

Most situations have some other person involved,

And that of course can change the trajectory of any moment,

Right?

If there's somebody else making other decisions,

It can change,

But most of the time,

Generally,

Good choices breed good outcomes.

When we are in level four thinking,

We choose to take the lead in our lives and make decisions that work for us.

We assert ourselves in our lives.

In the moment,

We show up.

This is where I want you to be.

If you cannot get to level five,

Here is totally acceptable.

Now,

Level five,

The level of all levels,

Level five is the energetic and enthusiastic decision-making that makes you feel good,

Right?

This is the pinnacle of decision-making.

This is the space in which you feel empowered.

You make decisions based on what's aligning in your life,

Your purpose,

Where you currently are,

And where you're working to be.

It's here we're motivated.

We're aligned,

In tuned with ourselves.

We're active.

We're happy.

We're thinking about our choices,

Even if they're wrapped in drama,

Chaos,

And hard moments.

Let me give you a really powerful example.

A few years ago,

I had a wonderful lady that I had been working with for quite some time.

She came to be unhappy in her marriage.

She really didn't have any self-esteem.

In fact,

It was pretty shot.

Her trauma story was owning her.

Everything she did was wrapped in anxiety and wondering how she would ever find a way out of the place that she was in.

Her ability to make and own decisions was like negative zero.

We began to work on all of these levels.

About six or seven months,

I guess it was,

Into our time together,

She sent me an SOS message.

I called her immediately.

You know,

What's wrong?

Because this was the first time in all of the time we'd worked together that she had sent a message like that.

It was a good SOS.

She was celebrating her choices.

Within a few hours,

She had landed her dream job and quit the one that she had been complaining about.

It had been draining her for a number of years.

She was also going through a divorce at this time.

She told me that she picked up the phone to end the feud that they had been in because she decided to choose peace.

Her life was shifting.

She was empowered.

She knew that that feud did not align with what she wanted in her life.

She said,

I heard you say to me,

Does this align with what I want?

The job was a yes,

Absolutely.

She felt empowered to not worry about the details and just go all in.

She said,

I want to start to really see myself.

And I had to ask myself,

Does the fight over things and money really matter that much to me?

And when I knew it didn't,

I called him.

I knew what I wanted and needed were not aligned with the actions that I was taking.

So I made a choice.

My friends,

That is level five thinking and choice making.

When you know that that doesn't align and you make the choice,

Even if it's hard to do something different.

That's the question I want you asking all the time.

Does this align?

This is the frame of thought that is so very powerful.

Of course,

There was a lot that went into helping her get to level five thinking,

Right?

It wasn't overnight.

Like I said,

We'd been working with each other for quite some time and beyond trauma healing and changing her self-worth and self-confidence.

There were a few methods that I gave her to overcome that fear of doing something wrong of the,

I don't know,

Making the wrong choices or really just learning how to show up.

So that's what I want to hand over to you right now.

And as we move through these steps,

Please know that not every single one has to be present if it doesn't match an individual situation.

So often I give you steps here and then I get emails asking me if they need to do those steps,

Even if it's not aligned or if the situation is not present.

And the answer is always no.

Everything I teach is not firm.

This is a guideline.

These are workable solutions,

Tools to help you get to where you want to go.

I'm never going to tell anyone exactly what to do in their life.

This is your life.

These are nothing more than the tools to assist you.

If it works for you,

Great.

Use it.

If it doesn't,

Extract what you need,

Trash the rest.

So let's get to the steps.

There's a few of them.

Step one,

I want you making small,

Actionable decisions.

What does that mean?

First,

I want you to acknowledge that making a decision is scary.

Sometimes we don't know.

Sometimes we are scared out of our minds.

But in order to break the chains,

You have to let that go and just go for it.

Face the fear and make a choice.

We absolutely live in this world of all or nothing,

This black and white thinking,

And that is terrible for our mindsets.

But we don't actually have to make the entirety of every decision when we're looking at a problem.

I want you to hear that.

We don't have to look at the entire problem to make a decision.

Generally,

When we do,

That's where fear comes in.

I don't know how to handle this because it's so big.

Let's make small,

Actionable decisions.

Let's narrow it down.

Let's clean up our focus.

The most important part of the situation,

The most urgent part,

Is where you always should start.

Doing this helps reduce the fear.

It breaks down the moment into manageable chunks and helps you get into a space where you know where to start.

Okay?

This is what I want you to know.

Step two is to reduce the number of decisions within the situation.

Again,

Like I said,

We don't have to make an entire choice over the entire situation,

But then we can actually go a step further and reduce the number.

One of the best ways to overcome the fear of decision-making is to set yourself up to make less decisions.

Right?

That seems very simple,

But I know it's not.

But I want you to know that it's always available to you,

And that really does start in your day-to-day life.

For example,

Say you struggled to get everyone on the same page about dinner,

And that's exhausting to you.

That's a real thing for many people.

While it may not cause fear in you,

It can cause you to get into decision fatigue.

So once you are in a place where you have to make bigger choices,

You may already be done.

Right?

So get organized.

Reduce the number of worry points by really creating a meal plan and sticking with it.

Steve Jobs once said that he wore the same outfit every single day so that he could use his brain power on bigger decisions.

I mean,

I couldn't do that,

But maybe it's pretty brilliant.

Right?

As to reducing the number of decisions in a fear-based moment,

Once you've broken down the experience into smaller chunks,

Begin to weed out the insignificant things.

If you reduce the moment to only the facts and then you look at what needs to be addressed,

You're reducing the anxiety,

Right?

The forecasting.

When anxiety is lessened,

You allow yourself to move beyond the fear.

And everything,

We want to work within what's manageable.

So get curious.

Get really,

Really curious.

Right?

And this is our next step.

When you've broken it down and you take small steps toward aligning your mind and allowing your mind to get into a simpler path forward,

You need to get curious and ask yourself questions like,

What's the worst possible outcome?

Then you can ask,

What's the likelihood that that's going to occur?

Once you know,

You can move back into your mindset and then get into a positive place and ask,

If things did work out,

What would it look like?

Explore.

Get curious.

It's important to know the risk and reward.

When fear is involved,

We worry about our safety,

Which means we naturally look for the negatives.

But when we reduce the fear,

We have the ability to look for the possibilities.

Step four,

Find the why.

What does that mean?

Why is this happening?

No,

That's not necessarily what I mean.

The why we are looking for in this place is,

What would I want to be an outcome for me?

Why will this outcome support me?

Before you move into action,

Ask yourself,

What is my motivation for this to work out?

Why?

Find the why.

Step five,

Shift your point of view.

Try to imagine really facing your choice as someone else rather than yourself.

You can do this by asking yet another question.

What would X do?

What would Danielle do if she was in this situation?

What would my mom do if she was in this situation?

Then try to step outside of yourself and see the situation where you can really look at it from a space of perspective and evaluation.

So shift your POV.

Step six,

I want you to start listening to your thoughts.

First,

Are they true?

If fear is in charge and it's a liar,

Are you really having thoughts that are based in fact?

Probably not.

So listen.

Listen to what's happening within your mind.

If it's a lie,

Give yourself permission to reject the thought.

When you do this,

You're able to take failure off the table.

Which what is failure?

It's fear.

If you combine the why,

The motivation,

And hear what's happening within your head,

You realize most choices are not permanent.

You can always shift,

Change course,

Correct your mistakes.

So,

So important.

And when you're in this mindset,

You can go into step seven.

If you still can't get yourself out of that fear cycle and into choice,

I want you to go into your history.

What has the past taught you?

What can you extract from your past mistakes and apply it into the now?

Honestly,

Who cares if you've actually made a mistake once or twice or multiple times?

There's still something to be learned from every situation.

And ultimately,

Sometimes the best lesson in all of that is that you did the damn thing even when stakes were high.

You took action and had to deal with less than optimal outcomes.

But this is a lesson because now you are more informed that the next time you're hit with a similar situation,

You can make a different decision.

This is only happening for you if you've had mistakes,

If you've learned from situations that,

You know,

Weren't so great.

Your brain needs evidence to make informed decisions.

A mistake is evidence.

It's a textbook to what not to do.

I don't see mistakes or even fear as failure.

I see it as feedback.

Can you shift your mind into that space?

Fear wants you to sit still.

It wants you to sit in it,

But you don't have to.

If you use all of those steps,

Though,

What is lacking?

What can still cause fear?

The answer is self-trust.

We have to trust ourselves.

We have to understand that we are the only ones who can make decisions and choices that best serve us.

So let's quickly talk about self-trust for just a second,

Even building it,

Because the small steps to building self-trust is to make a promise to yourself and stick to it.

It's to prove to yourself that you have enough power to make your life work for you.

In that acceptance,

You have to take responsibility for where you are.

You take into accountability what's occurred,

The why,

And you ask yourself,

What's the root?

Why can't I trust myself?

Most of the time,

The lack of self-trust is traced back to a single event or a set of small events that told us we can't handle ourselves correctly.

Or maybe you were told that often as a child,

And we say,

Nope,

Don't have the ability to make a decision.

But here's the deal.

The person you are now is not the person you were then.

Let me say that again.

The person you are now is not the person that made that mistake.

It's not the person who didn't know.

It's not the person that you are because you have grown.

You've had many experiences,

And that story that you're telling yourself is no longer true.

So I want you to get out of it.

You have to trust yourself.

You have to be able to develop a sense of value.

Value shows us how we trust ourselves,

Why we trust ourselves,

And the lack of value means a lack of trust.

If you need more on trust,

Go to episode 86,

The Ultimate Guide to Self-Trust,

Because I go through how to build self-trust.

Again,

In order to make firm,

Grounded,

Empowered decisions,

Those level five decisions,

You have to be able to trust yourself.

So I'll link that episode in the show notes too,

Or just scroll on whatever platform you're on.

It's episode 86.

Ultimately,

Though,

The decisions,

The situations,

The experiences in your life are only scary because you refuse to take control.

You refuse to get out of the I don't know and do something about it.

Fear cannot dictate your life or put you in a passive role if you want something great.

Fear can be crippling.

I understand that.

I get it.

But is it really worth staying in that space?

Both are uncomfortable.

Growth?

Uncomfortable.

Fear?

Uncomfortable.

Do you want to stay in the uncomfortableness of holding yourself hostage or do you want to move forward?

Fear is an emotion just like happiness and joy.

It's a shower of where you are.

It's a direction pointer.

Trust your gut.

Ask for help when you need it and rest in the assured knowing that mistakes are going to happen.

More importantly,

Though,

Know that making a mistake is really how we learn.

It's how we bounce back.

These small steps are going to help you move towards functioning in the world filled with so many small and large decisions.

You can do it.

You can take control.

You can find that fear is not the thing that has to ruin and rule your life.

Instead,

That can be you.

And when you realize that,

When you step into that power,

Is when you know that you're at level five.

Thank you for taking the time to listen and being here with me today.

I hope this offered you some deep insights on how to make decisions outside of fear.