Breaking the Grip of Fear
by 
Eric Disco
This video (safe for work) is probably one of the scariest things I’ve ever seen. Fresh out of one of my nightmares.
It shows what it’s like to climb to the top of a 1700 foot tower–with no safety lines.
If you had the opportunity, would you climb the 1700 foot tower in the video? Some of you would do it because have balls the size of Texas (or are extremely stupid). But most of you probably would not do it.
That’s your fear acting in a good way.
It’s same fear is trying to keep you alive when you go to talk to women. It’s a remnant of your primal brain telling you to stay alive.
If tried to climb this tower, your fear would actually make it more dangerous.
Why?
Let’s say you were climbing the exact same ladder, but it only goes 10 feet off the ground. Chances are you wouldn’t be too hurt if you fell and you almost definitely wouldn’t die.
You’re not too scared.
But put that same ladder thousands of feet in the air, like in this video, and all of a sudden something else is going on in your body.
Your blood runs cold. You may feel light-headed or get vertigo. Your muscles become stiff.
Your fear makes it more likely that you will fall and die.
Fear is a signal that alerts you when there’s danger. It’s an alarm that tells you when the house is on fire. But in this case, the alarm itself seems to burn the house down.
What the fuck? How could human beings have evolved this way? Wouldn’t human beings have adapted something like this out of our behavior?
How can this be beneficial?
The answer is that it is beneficial. While the fear certainly does keep you from performing optimally, your fear would likely keep you from climbing that high in the first place.
Your fear keeps you from stepping out onto that ledge at all.
It’s called inhibition, and it serves a variety of purposes.
When in a dangerous situation, animals experience fight, flight or tonic immobility.
If a mouse is caught by a cat and knows it has no way out (flight), it certainly can’t fight.
So it “plays” dead. It actually becomes paralyzed. It’s called tonic immobility. It’s a paralysis that overtakes the body.
This serves a purpose. As a predator, cats are inclined to kill living things for food rather than eat things that are already dead because it’s not fresh. So there’s more of a chance that it will leave the mouse alone.
Human beings go through the same thing when they experience fear.
Human beings are extremely social creatures. We live in groups. None of us would survive very long out in the wilderness on our own. We’ve evolved and adapted behaviors to function in groups.
Inhibition becomes extremely important when we’re looking at social animals. In order to function optimally as social animals, the group needs to stay together through internal conflict.
So what happens when there’s a conflict between individuals within the group?
Fight must be minimized. If animals were always fighting to the death within groups, that would be a problem.
And in order to stay together as a group, flight must be minimized. If a member left the group every time there was a problem, it wouldn’t be long before the group was dispersed.
Therefore, internal inhibition is one of the most important social behaviors in keeping groups together through conflict.
Humans have evolved a very elaborate disinclination to take action that may jeopardize their standing within the community.
Everyone has experienced this. You want to go to talk to a girl, but you feel this invisible force paralyzing you.
Or maybe there’s a large group of people joking and talking and you want to speak up, but a fear grips you and you just can’t do it.
There are a lot of behaviors that define the leader, the alpha male, the confident guy. He speaks loudly. He takes up space. He is comfortable as the center of attention.
But the most important characteristic of the leader is how much internal inhibition he experiences. The most important characteristic of a leader is whether or not he can take social initiative.
Most guys, all their lives, they live practice giving in to their inhibition. They have learned to live their lives with a submissive strategy. And it leaks out to every other aspect of their behavior.
Luckily this can be changed.
With practice, just as these men learn to climb the ladder without fear by doing it every day, you can also teach your body that there’s nothing to be afraid of.
As you practice each day climbing to slightly higher heights, eventually your body becomes comfortable going higher and higher.
This article was simultaneously posted on InnerConfidence.com
Posted in Acceptance, Self-Improvement Strategies | 
15 Comments »
Video was intense, another great post my man!
Holy shit. I kind of want to forget I ever saw that, it’s so mindboggling!
I wonder if that guy gets approach anxiety.
he must be pissed that the girl stood him up…
so if i climb a tower like that will i loose fear of approaching girls?
Yes, you will!
N u hav 2 dive 4m there !!!!!!!
No, you actually won’t. They are two very different things. Yes, if you are able to learn to climb this tower, it will help you to understand how your body reacts to fear when you approach women.
But in practicing getting past fear, if the action you’re practicing (climbing a pole) is very different from the exact action you want to take (approaching women), it will have less effect on helping the action you want to take (approaching women).
For example, becoming a fighter takes bravery but it is fairly different from approaching. Public speaking, because it induces a social fear, is closer to approaching women and will help you more than becoming a great fighter. But even that is not as good as practicing over and over approaching women.
“A shy man,†wrote Charles Darwin in 1872, “no doubt dreads the notice of strangers, but can hardly be said to be afraid of them; he may be as bold as a hero in battle, and yet have no self-confidence about trifles in the presence of strangers.”
Eric
One of my friends actually took a workshop with a guy who was a Navy Seal. This guy was brave as hell. He had killed guys, been injured in battle, gotten medals for valor. But he had huge approach anxiety. It was impossible for him to walk up to a girl and talk to her.
I talk about this more in http://approachanxiety.com/2007/02/even-rock-stars-get-approach-anxiety/
Eric
Wow Eric, thats really surprising, did he overcome his AA?
Fixed link: http://approachanxiety.com/2007/02/even-rock-stars-get-approach-anxiety/
I can attest to everything Eric said in his response to brad. I’ve been skydiving, bungee jumping, cliff diving, and broken my neck in a motorcycle — crash but still ride. I have no trouble suppressing my fear of public speaking.
It’s still taking me years to even come close to overcoming my AA.
The big difference for me is that I’m in more control of the former situations, while approaching girls requires me to put a lot of control in someone else’s (the girl’s) hands (i.e., trusting that she won’t crush my fragile ego). Which means, of course, that I have to get past the idea that her rejecting me is “control” at all.
Good question. I don’t know. I’ll ask my friend next time I see him.
Eric
I’ve been a fan of your website for a long time now and i smiled when i saw the video. I’m a transmission lineman myself and i can tell you right now. No one that i know of as ever climbed a tower not strapped to the tower itself.
The guy you see in the video is really stupid and would lost his job if his boss ever knew what was going on !
If you have any question on the matter, feel free to ask !
Ha ha, that’s awesome. Thanks for the comment.
Eric
Great article on fear Eric. But is there steps, ideas you can provide on how to keep climbing this latter. I’ve just came back from a 3 week Europe vacation with 2 friends, it was exciting. It also made me realize I’ve thus far lived a sheltered life.
But every time I try to climb the fear tower to higher and higher heights, I burn out. Is there a way to actually have fun climbing this tower of fear? Because fear seems to tire out my body pretty well, it tires me out.