“So thoughts turn us all into cowards, And our resolve withers like a flower In the sterility of a mental dead end, So plans with a scope perish, Promising success at the beginning, From long delays.” Shakespeare . Hamlet's monologue “To be or not to be, that is the question.” Since childhood, we have been taught: “Measure twice and cut once,” meaning that before doing something, we must carefully think and analyze everything , and only then act. That is, we were taught not to act rashly. There is some truth in this. But there is another truth, which is that the more we think about an action, the less energy we have left for the action itself, the more we get bogged down in our doubts and fears. We have the intention to do something, but then then concerns and fears enter, the rationalizing mind begins, and begins: “What if I don’t succeed?”, “How will I look in the eyes of others?”, “What will they think of me?”... And under these thoughts emotions swirl: on the one hand, interest, the desire to get a certain result, and on the other hand, fear and uncertainty. In general, interest, uncertainty and fear very often “walk hand in hand”. The more we want to achieve a certain result, the more interested we are in it, the greater the likelihood of fear and uncertainty. If we are not interested in something, then we don’t care. It turns out to be a kind of paradox. This is not always the case, but it happens often. As a rule, we are constrained by the fear of receiving an impartial reflection - we are afraid for our own “face”, we are afraid of our own failure, what they will say about us, what they will think about us, what impression we will make, etc. And it would be okay if we did not go into action and forgot about it. They didn’t go in, they didn’t go in, they didn’t do it, they didn’t do it – what’s the problem? But then we begin to “eat away our liver”, punish ourselves for imperfections and lose the remnants of self-confidence. What to do if you experience fear of action, uncertainty, doubts? Firstly, you need to stop executing yourself and crucifying yourself for these emotions . We are all human, we all experience the same things. Remember that fear, uncertainty, doubt are inherent in all of us. For example, according to psychologists, 95% of people experience fear of speaking. Even famous actors, before going on stage, reading the same text for years, experience fear, excitement, and uncertainty. But this disappears when they get on stage and get immersed in the action. There is only one way out: observe your doubts, fears, insecurities and act. Remember that the more we execute and crucify ourselves, the less strength and confidence we have left for action. Secondly, you need to start observing your emotions. Observing emotions is being aware of them, without pros and cons, without attacking either oneself or another. Because the more we fight with some emotion, the more we become “dragged” by it. Try to describe the emotion you are experiencing as an observer: where it arises, in what place, is it hot or cold, what is its image, what color, smell, what sensations arise in the physical body, what associations arise, and you will see that the intensity of the emotion will begin to fall There is a parable about white monkeys, the essence of which is that a person who has never thought about white monkeys is given the task of categorically not thinking about them. Otherwise, he will not get what he so passionately desires. At first, he treated this task with disdain, saying, just think, I never thought about them. And then he couldn’t think about anything but white monkeys. They even began to haunt him in visions. In the end, he came running with a request to rid him of the white monkeys :) It is useless to fight emotions. The more we fight them, the more they persecute us. It is also useless to be distracted - we will return to them anyway. You need to learn to be aware of emotions. Thirdly, you need to take action. I have already written about how even very experienced actors can experience anxiety, uncertainty and fear..