Thread by @athrvakhrbde

Why you should define your fears instead of your goals | By @tferriss

In 1999, one day, Tim was sitting in his van, when he had decided to commit suicide.
And he went from deciding to full blown planning very quickly.

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He was really close to death. The only reason he took his finger off the trigger, was a few lucky coincidences.

The element of chance scared him the most. Tim was very methodical about ways of managing his ups and downs.

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Many normal people may have 6-10 major depressive episodes in their lives, Tim had 50+, cuz he has Bipolar Depression.

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Rather than giving a recipe for success, Tim decided to share the recipe for avoiding self destruction and self paralysis.

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The most reliable tool which has proven to be the safety net for emotional freefall, which is the same tool that enabled Tim to take his best business decisions, and it is Stoicism.

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Stoicism has spread like wildfire in top of the NFL ranks as a means of mental toughness training

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Why would people of action focus on an ancient philosophy that seems very academic.

Let's think about Stoicism a little bit differently, an operating system for thriving in high stress environment, for making better decisions.

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We'll use Stoicism to train ourselves to separate what we can control from what we cannot control, and then doing exercises to focus exclusively on the former.

This decreases emotional reactivity, which can be a superpower.

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The quote "we suffer more often in imagination than in reality" by Seneca, made a huge impact on Tim's life.

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It let him to the tool itself, "The Premeditation of Evils", in simple terms, this is visualizing the worst case scenario in detail, that you fear, preventing you to take action, to overcome the paralysis

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Tim created a written exercise called Fear Setting, just like goal setting. It consists of 3 pages

1st Page: "What if I...?"

This is whatever you fear, whatever's causing you anxiety

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Here we have 3 columns, and in the 1st column "Define" you have to write down all the worst things you can imagine happening once you take that step, you want 10-20

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In the second column "Prevent", you're gonna write all of the things that can prevent the previous thing from the column "Define", or at least decrease the chance of it all happening

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Column 3, "Repair". If the worst case scenario has happened, what could you do to repair the damage even a little bit, or who could you ask for help.

Ask yourself, has anyone in the history of time figured this out, chances are really high for yes

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2nd Page: What might be the benefits of an attempt or partial success

3rd Page: The Cost of Inaction. Maybe the most important part.

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Ask yourself, "If I avoid this action and decision, what will my life look like in 6 months, 12 months and 3 years". Write it in detail, how will you be affected emotionally, financially, physically, etc.

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"You cannot imagine any life more beautiful than that of a Stoic" - Jerzy Gregorek

"Easy choices, hard life.
Hard choices, easy life." - Jerzy Gregorek

Ask yourself, where in your life right now, defining your fears is more important that defining your strengths

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