“You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face.” — Eleanor Roosevelt
My adventures last month started as a whim. On my way to an event in Phoenix, I looked out the airplane window and gasped at the Grand Canyon’s vast terrain below. The American Southwest’s arid expanse is one of my favorite places on earth. How can I travel that close and not visit?
So… I changed my plans. I moved my flight back, rented a car, set my alarm for 4:45am the next day, grabbed a mug of hot tea, drove through the dark and walked to the Grand Canyon South Rim to watch the earth awaken.
I found a spot to perch right beyond the railings and sat down. The colors started shifting from black to purple to gold, slowly revealing 5 to 6 million years of patient artistry. Being at the Grand Canyon always leaves me feeling both really small AND deeply empowered. I was ready to be moved.
What I wasn’t ready for was the soundtrack around me.
As the sky began to lighten, all I heard around me was: “Stay back from the edge!” “I can’t look down. It’s too far.” Parents warned their children. Partners grabbed arms. Some people turned their backs. As my day went on, those voices grew louder.
At the rim of the Grand Canyon, fear prevails. Our well honed survival instinct takes over. People have died falling in the Grand Canyon, but as Yale Philosopher Tamar Gendler, our evolutionary heritage takes over even when there is nothing to fear.
People travel hundreds, if not thousands of miles, for a once-in-a-lifetime encounter with the Grand Canyon, only to have it dulled by the veil of fear. The same survival instinct that has allowed our species to endure for millennia is also quietly robbing us of the very moments we came so far to embrace.
The Grand Canyon isn’t the only place fear takes a front seat. It follows us home. I see it in the leaders who hesitate before speaking an uncomfortable truth in a meeting, in the friend who won’t reach out after a falling out and in the person who stays in the job, the relationship, the familiar not because it’s working, but because the alternative feels too exposed.
Fear doesn’t just mute the view from the rim. It narrows the landscape of our lives. Our greatest challenges is trying to unburden ourselves from the veil of fear.
This month, I want to unveil fear. Our lives our filled with so many possibilities. I explore how fear stands in the way of reaching for them, and what research shows us we can do to ask these fears to step aside. Its not about getting rid of fear; its about living with fear AND still pushing forward.
My hope is that living a more full, connected life allows us to not only heal ourselves, but also our broader world.
Fear is not the problem. The problem is how we respond to our fears.
Our goal is not to remove fear, but to take steps forward despite the fears that we hold.
I remember watching as my college boyfriend hung up the phone and started pacing. He’d just pitched a bold program improvement to a senior leader in a company where he interened and offered to implement it himself. The call back was coming later that week. He was worried that the answer would be no. But he was more worried that the answer would be yes. The senior leader said yes. My college boyfriend is now a CEO.
My college boyfriend wasn’t devoid of fear. He was acting with courage amid the fear. I think of that moment frequently when I find myself hesitating.
Fear has a way of infiltrating all our actions, quietly standing in the background and keeping us from trying new things or connecting with other people. Psychologist Kurt Gray’s research helps explain why. In his book Outraged, he argues that humans have evolved not as apex predators, but as apex prey.
We are constantly scanning for who or what might harm us — and those assessments of harm define our moral judgments and our relationships. Gray finds that polarization happens not because people are irrational, but because we have different assessments of who the victim is. We’re all trying to protect someone. We just don’t agree on who needs protecting.
That insight reframes fear . It’s not a character flaw. It’s a deeply human response to feeling threatened. The problem isn’t the fear itself. Iit’s when fear becomes so loud that it drowns out curiosity, empathy, and connection. When that happens, we stop seeing people and start seeing threats. We narrow our world.
Think about the people at the Grand Canyon with their backs to the view. They weren’t wrong to be careful near a sheer drop. The danger was real. But fear had long since stopped being proportionate to the moment. Instead it swallowed the whole experience. They couldn’t see what they came to see.That’s what unchecked fear does. It does not allow us to live, but narrows our lives.
So what do we do? The goal is not to avoid the fear, but rather to be aware of it, hold it lightly, and don’t let it define our decisions.
"I learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but the
triumph over it. The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid,
but he who conquers that fear." - Nelson Mandela
Three ways to work with fear (without letting it take over):
1. Name the underlying fear.
Psychology research tells us that a lot of our most anxious reactions aren’t really about the immediate trigger, like the political post, the family argument, the colleague who sees the world differently. They’re about something deeper: a threat to our sense of meaning, safety, or identity.
When I notice myself reacting with disproportionate intensity, I’ve learned to ask: what is this actually about? Usually it’s something smaller and more specific than the narrative I’ve built around it. Naming it takes some of its power away. Try it in your next hard conversation. What’s the actual fear underneath your reaction? Safety? Belonging? Being seen?
2. Distinguish between danger and discomfort.
Gray’s research shows that when we frame a disagreement as harm, we lose access to curiosity. But not every uncomfortable conversation is actually dangerous. Most are just uncomfortable. Before you step back from the edge of a hard conversation or a challenging moment, ask: am I actually at risk here, or am I just near something that feels big?
The Grand Canyon can be dangerous if you’re not paying attention, but most of the time it is not. Learning to feel the difference in your body, not just your head, is one of the most useful things I know.
3. Step toward the view slowly.
At the Canyon, the people who got the most out of the experience weren’t the reckless ones who dangled over the edge. They were the ones who moved toward the rim slowly, found their footing, caught their breath, and let their eyes adjust to the scale.
That approach is the same for engaging with fear in your life and leadership, too. You don’t have to throw yourself into the most terrifying conversation first. But if you want to make progress, you have to take one step toward it. Ask one question you’ve been avoiding. Hear one perspective that challenges yours. Let yourself be curious for just a few minutes, before the armor goes back on. The view reveals itself gradually, if you let it.
What’s one fear that’s been quietly narrowing your life? I’d love to hear. Your reflections genuinely shape where this newsletter goes next.
Want to go deeper? Here's what I've been reading and listening to:
📖 Outraged: Why We Fight About Morality and Politics and How to Find Common Ground by Kurt Gray. This is one of the most genuinely clarifying books I've read in years about why our moral conversations have become so difficult. Gray doesn't let anyone off the hook , especially those of us that think of ourselves as open-minded. The practical implications are quietly radical.
📖How to hold a Cockaroach: A Book for Those Who Are Free and Don’t Know It, by Max Maxwell This beautiful illustrated book invites us to question what holds us back, and how we can move forward amid our fears and anxieties…. With huge gratitude for the recommendation from my oldest son.
📖 The Worm at the Core: On the Role of Death in Life by Sheldon Solomon, Jeff Greenberg & Tom Pyszczynski . The is the definitive accessible account of Terror Management Theory, written by its founders. It's surprisingly readable, and parts of it will unsettle you in the best way. Understanding why we react the way we do is the first step to reacting differently.
🎧 Hidden Brain: "The Fear Factor" Shankar Vedantam's podcast has done several episodes on fear and decision-making that are excellent companions to this topic. Great for a commute or a walk.
🔬 For the researchers among you:
Greenberg, J., Pyszczynski, T., & Solomon, S. (1986). "The causes and consequences of the need for self-esteem: A terror management theory." A foundational paper if you want the original argument in full. - Link
Schein, C., & Gray, K. (2018). The theory of dyadic morality: Reinventing moral judgment by redefining harm. Personality and social psychology review. Gray’s research about harm-based moral theory along with colleague Chelsea Schein. - Link
Upcoming travels — come find me in person:
May 2026 - Vlore, Albania
May 2026 - COSI Conference, Oxford, UK
May 2026 - Yale Reunions; New Haven, CT
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Really excellent piece