The story illustrates the contrast between being driven by fear and being driven by continual improvement. The fear-driven approach leads to caution, slowness, and a constant fear of failure, hindering potential greatness. On the other hand, the continual improvement mindset focuses on becoming better, more efficient, and safer at every task. This insight prompts reflection on one's own motivations, highlighting the discomfort of realizing a dominance of fear-driven actions in one's life.
How can you summon courage when you’re terrified? Is hiking more dangerous than skiing? And what is the stupidest thing that Mike has ever done?
- SOURCES:
- Albert Bandura, professor of psychology at Stanford University.
- Marc Brackett, founding director of the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence and professor in the Child Study Center at Yale School of Medicine.
- Lisa Damour, clinical psychologist and senior advisor to the Schubert Center for Child Studies at Case Western Reserve University.
- Christopher Peterson, professor of psychology and organizational studies at the University of Michigan.
- Stanley Rachman, professor of psychology at the University of British Columbia.
- Mikaela Shiffrin, Olympic alpine skier.
- Lindsey Vonn, Olympic alpine skier.
- Shaun White, Olympic snowboarder.
- Joseph Wolpe, 20th-century South African psychiatrist.
- RESOURCES:
- The Emotional Lives of Teenagers: Raising Connected, Capable, and Compassionate Adolescents, by Lisa Damour (2023).
- "What Scares the World’s Most Daring Olympians," by John Branch, Mark Boyer, Larry Buchanan, Emily Rhyne, Bedel Saget, Joe Ward, and Jeremy White (The New York Times, 2022).
- "The Upside of Anxiety," by Christina Caron (The New York Times, 2022).
- Permission to Feel: Unlocking the Power of Emotions to Help Our Kids, Ourselves, and Our Society Thrive, by Marc Brackett (2019).
- "World With No Fear," by Invisibilia (2015).
- Abū Zayd Al-Balkhī''s Sustenance of the Soul: The Cognitive Behavior Therapy of a Ninth Century Physician, by Malik Badri (2013).
- "Searching for the Source of a Fountain of Courage," by Natalie Angier (The New York Times, 2011).
- Character Strengths and Virtues: A Handbook and Classification, by Christopher Peterson and Martin Seligman (2004).
- Fear and Courage, by Stanley Rachman (1978).
- "Relative Efficacy of Desensitization and Modeling Approaches for Inducing Behavioral, Affective, and Attitudinal Changes," by Albert Bandura, E. B. Blahard, and B. Ritter (Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1969).
