"I'm sorry I have to leave you now; I've got The Fear."

Lately, I've been reading a lot on the subject of fear. As the zen kitchen gets closer to its second anniversary and things are starting to explode faster than I honestly thought they could, the typical entrepreneur fears - WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE!!!! - pop up more frequently than ever, and I have to take a step back now and again to look back at all I've accomplished in the past couple of years in order to actually get through it and be productive.

The funny thing about fear is that, all too often, it's unwarranted. In fact, a recent Yoga Journal article had a great Mark Twain quote that I thought particularly appropriate when it comes to those nagging fears:

I've been through some incredibly horrible things in my life, some of which actually happened.

While I certainly can't say that I've never had bad things happen to me, or that I've never had a real reason to be afraid, but I can honestly say that the majority of the time that I've been deathly afraid of failure in some particular aspect of life/business, the moment I just said "hello" to the fear and did whatever it was anyway, not only did I succeed, I realized that nothing I had feared was nearly as bad/tragic as I thought it was. Then again, I am prone to drama.

The Marketing Mix Blog had an interesting post about just this topic recently. Sherri Loomis of SL4 Design (and oh look - she's a green designer too!) shared her story about the fear of cold calling, something I can't say I don't share with her. It's a short, but good, read.

Just remember one thing about fear - if you're afraid of it, it's probably good for you.

That is, unless it's a guy chasing you down the street with a knife. But really - that doesn't happen that often.