Staring Into the Abyss as a Core Life Skill

Real toughness is about acceptance: of who you are, what you’re going through, and the discomfort that often comes with it. It’s living in that place of tension so that the needed space can be created to find the best path forward.

The Value of Struggling

But if they seem daunting, there’s value in lowering your emotional temperature. One way to do this is to buck the self-help trend of “visualizing your success.” Instead, do the opposite. Spend some time focusing on the worst-case scenario.

We need to grip our anxieties head on and force ourselves to imagine what might happen if their vague catastrophic forebodings truly came to pass: what would happen to us if everything we are dimly worried about really came to pass? What are the real dangers? How might we still be OK, even if it all fell apart? Entertaining the most extreme consequ

Fear is part of the human condition. Fear of loneliness, fear of getting old, fear of failure—even the most successful among us encounter every one of these.