Handle with Care - Fear of New Places
You dread starting a new job that is very different than the ones you’ve had, like driving to places you haven’t driven before. You may be so scared of the unknown, the new challenges, that you don’t even want to apply for the job.
Endless number of “What if…?’s flood your mind. You may even recall one or two past experiences when things went wrong and you got lost, ridiculed, or even hurt. What if that happens again?
Your self-confidence is down in the basement or even lower than that: six feet under – dead.
Anxiety flares up and so does the rest of your body. Every ailment you can think of seems to attack you all at once. Perhaps it’s better to stay put. Don’t take risks. The evil that we know is still more comforting that the evil that we don’t know.
Should I go to that new place that I haven’t been before? If so, how?
How do I decide?
Skeletons in your closet and roaring lions around every corner. Your imagination is probably the scariest thing you'll ever meet in your life. Reality - you can handle. But when you are looking into the pitch dark and don't know what to expect, your mind fills up the dark with the worst nightmares that you keep carrying in your head. Let there be light.
How can I regain composure and do what I have to do?
First things first: Breathe. You are safe.
Although situations are many and each personality may require a different approach, there are some steps that you can take to sooth your fear of moving into “uncharted” territories. Stop the scary thoughts that readily flood your mind. Breathe. Reach deeper to what you already know. Remind yourself that you have choices. And boost your self-confidence by encouraging yourself.
#1: Stop telling yourself horror stories from the past
Stop imagining catastrophic outcomes. Your brain may readily recall all the crash movies you’ve ever seen when your flight is in a light turbulence, allegedly to prepare you to flight or fight. Your mood and the memories you recall are birds of a feather: feeling frightened, you reflexively recall scary memories.
But you don't have to indulge yourself in those memories. You can’t control what ideas jump into your mind but have the ultimate say in what you’re willing to entertain. Just because you have to work a bit harder to think of pleasantries to replace the automatic negative flashbacks, it doesn’t mean you should give up trying.
Even if you’ve had bad experiences in the past, you can tell yourself that this is a new situation, independent from the past, and the same crash-and-burn is NOT going to happen this time. You have learned from the past and you'll do things differently now. This a different place, a different time, and different people. Push yourself to imagine good outcome: you are at the place that you've been looking for and the new boss and colleagues will like you and recognize your expertise. After all, there is a reason why they’ve hired you over many alternatives.
#2: Breathe and keep breathing
Your breathing, heart rate, and blood pressure automatically spike when you think you are in danger. While you think you are in danger, your basic brain takes over and drives the fight-flight reaction, which may take you to safety fast but not the most sophisticated response to complex situations. You can push yourself to slow your breathing and make it really deep. Imagine that you are smelling the roses or your grannie's cinnamon-spiked apple pie, or whatever good smells you can recall. You can also imagine that you are blowing soap bubbles and you want to blow a really, really big one that requires slow, long, soft and steady exhale. With all our intergalactic technology in our pockets, breathing is still the best anxiety management tool we have and it’s always at your disposal.
#3: Remind yourself that the “NEW” is not completely new - you do know something
You always have “transferrable skills”. What frightens you the most in this new situation is probably the fact that you focus on the “new” part; the “I haven’t done this yet”; on being in the "pitch dark". You turn your attention to what you don't know, away from what you do know, and you find yourself lost. We practice skills that are tailored to each situation to become familiar and comfortable. You, as the rest of us animated beings, dread the unknown because you don’t know how act to survive if the environment is unpredictable. We dread situation that we can’t control.
Well, make the “unknown” “known” and regain control. Use your rational mind to populate the unknown with things you already know. When driving to a new place, for instance, you remind yourself that you already know how to drive a car; how to read sings; how to slow down and stop if you need to; how to turn around; read maps, ask Siri; or speak a language and ask for help. And you already know how to correct a mistake if you miss your turn: you come back to it and do it again. You may want to leave earlier than usual to give yourself ample time in case you get lost or need to find parking. It’s easy. You have done these things a million times before; only the context has changed.
At a new job, you know you have skills: typing; smiling in a friendly manner; paying attention; taking notes; asking for help; “Hi, I’m new here, would you …?” And you can figure out how you can use your old skills from past jobs in this new context. You also know how to learn new things. What you most likely need, at least first, is not new skills but the mental associations of how to use those old skills in a new context or novel ways. You have used your broom to sweep the floor at your home; now you can use someone else’s different-looking broom to pick spider webs from the corners or use it as a brush to paint if you have no alternatives. Something like that.
Remember that a problem is a problem only if your head is already full of prohibitions, of things you are not willing to do for success, such as “No way I’m going to ask for help/directions”; “People will think I’m crazy” which translates to “I'm not willing to appear as if I didn’t know what I’m doing”. My guess is that many employers know that you don’t know; they are just waiting for you to admit that and humbly find your way through it and start to connect and become part of the team. Admitting that you don't know and asking for help is, I assume, better than making big mistakes and then having to correct them.
#4: Know that you have choices
If worst come to worst, you know that you don’t have to do this. It was your choice to travel to the new place or travel alone. It was your choice to interview for this position. Thinking of this situation as your "choice" rather than a must, will likely alleviate the immense pressure you are putting on yourself. Feel the difference. Reassuring yourself that you could walk away as an alternative, that you have a choice and therefore control over your actions and with it the outcome, you can bring back cosmos into chaos, safety into the unknown. If you say you are a chicken if you don’t dare, it’s still your choice to do that.
Thinking of it as a "choice" also reminds you why you’ve undertaken these challenges. You have a goal. Can you keep your eyes on the prize? Fear is evoked when you are thinking of what you can potentially lose. You can turn fear into thrill when you focus on the gains.
If the people in the new environment are really the kind who pick on people in dire need, then that’s a tale for another night. But for now, do you want to travel to, or work in this hostile environment? Do you have the guts or nerves to fight back? Are you comfortable with making enemies? Is this challenge worth your effort?
#5: Self-confidence is a thing that you do, not something that is bestowed on you
Self-confidence is the story that you are telling yourself about you and practice over time. Self-confidence is a training in certain beliefs. It is NOT something that is born, or die, with you. The more you accept responsibility for correcting your story in your head, the less your past will rule your future. Become aware of what you are telling yourself then shape it to what you want it to be.
Your level of confidence, or sense of safety in other words, may not change immediately, but the more you practice the better you become at it. Your low self-esteem didn’t come to you overnight. You have practiced it since childhood. The younger you pick up a behavior, like telling yourself who you are, the more it feels like your nature. Yet, it’s still up to you to change. You may not become an instinctive piano player if you start as an adult vs. as a child, but it’s never too late to enjoy the rest of your years by shaping your days to how you want them to be. It’s not what’s behind you that matters – but what’s ahead of you. Will you work to overcome your self-doubt?
Treat yourself the way you want to be treated.
If you wouldn’t say it or do it to your best friend, don’t do it to yourself. Write your script, literally, of what you’d like to hear when you are in deep shit and tell yourself just that. If you treat yourself kindly, you will feel safe no matter the blizzards around you. If you kick yourself when you’re down, it doesn’t matter how much love you are surrounded with – you will always feel unsafe. Harsh punishment (hurting yourself when things don’t work out well) is not a good motivator for doing great things in the future. Countless scientific studies and practice have shown that. Watching out for and rewarding yourself for the tiniest thing you have done well and encouraging yourself to do more of it, or do even better next time, is the way to go. Even if your parents didn’t treat you this way, you can still do.
Self-confidence's sworn enemy is shame. It wants you to hide yourself and hide your gifts. It's up to you to prove it wrong.
Ultimately, what’s the worst thing that can happen?
Would you have to turn around with your mission undone? Yes, it’s possible. But how likely that it would happen? And even if it does happen, would that be "The End" of you?
Is it possible that you’d NEVER EVER learn the skills you need in this new situation? Is it probable? If so, then what? How likely is it that you’d never find your way out? Only if you give up looking.
Of course, it hurts to stumble and fall and bruise your knees or hindside. But is the pain going to be there forever? Are these possibilities really so unbearable that they are worth dreading; lose sleep over; and ultimately, creating self-fulfilling prophesies? Just explore your mind: what’s the worst thing that can happen? What’s the probability that it would? And then what? If you go down this route you’ll see that there is always a solution to even your worst nightmares.
If worst-case thinking is something you struggle with regularly, anxiety therapy can help you manage anxious thoughts and develop a greater sense of confidence when facing life's uncertainties.
I’d love to hear what you’re thinking about these topics. If you have questions or would like to discuss something you’ve read, please get in touch.
This article is an update of a blog that was originally published on https://majapsychotherapy.com
Marianna Jakucska is a licensed marriage and family therapist in Sacramento, CA. She does psychotherapy online across California, in a setting that is variably called telehealth, video therapy or therapy-over-the-internet. She specializes in collaborative working with highly perceptive/sensitive people, the creative and the “misfit” to assist them in building a fulfilling life. Her clinical focus is on developmental trauma, depression, anxiety, cultural adjustment, and people single over 30; CBT, DBT, Existential and Eclectic approaches. She is bilingual in Hungarian and brings a broad cultural perspective into her therapeutic work. She is supportive of the LGBTQ Community and people who are seeking spiritual as well as mundane meaning to their life.