how you overcome a fear essay

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Essay on Fear in 600 Words: Steps to Overcome Fear

• Updated on  
• Mar 22, 2024

Essay on fear: Fear is a feeling of apprehension, anxiety, or dread in response to a perceived threat or danger. We all fear something. Fear can be caused by any situation, stimuli, individual, or past memory. Fear activates our fight-or-flight response, a surge of hormones like adrenaline that prepares us to face danger head-on or escape a risky situation. 

Overcoming fear requires courage, determination, and willpower. A person who has hydrophobia can overcome his/her fear through exposure therapy under an expert, cognitive behavioral therapy, and efforts. Fearing something for a long time can lead to persistent anxiety and stress, causing symptoms like racing thoughts, difficulty sleeping, muscle tension, and fatigue.

Table of Contents

• 1 Why Do We Fear?
• 2 What Are Some Popular Fears/ Phobias?
• 3 Steps to Overcome Fear
• 4 10 Motivational Quotes to Overcome Fear

Also Read: Essay on Chandrayaan 3

Why Do We Fear?

There are several causes of fear. Humans and animals fear a specific stimulus associated with their unpleasant memories. Our response to fear varies. 

Survival instinct can lead to fear. Individuals who are more cautious and alert to potential dangers are more likely to survive and pass on their genes. Fear drives us to react quickly to threats. This reaction is mostly of fighting or fleeing, increasing our chances of survival. 

Personal experiences or learned behavior can be a cause of fear. A person with a negative experience with a particular situation or object may develop fear or phobia associated with it. This learned fear helps us avoid potential harm in the future.

Our lives are greatly influenced by our cultural and social values. Societal norms, religious beliefs, and cultural traditions often influence what we perceive as threatening or dangerous. 

What Are Some Popular Fears/ Phobias?

The list of fears or phobias is endless. Some of the popular fears/ phobias are:

• Fear or Darkness – Achluophobia
• Fear of Heights – Acrophobia
• Fear of Flying – Aerophobia
• Fear of Failure – Atychiphobia
• Fear of Being Alone – Autophobia
• Fear of Bacteria – Bacteriophobia
• Fear of Gravity – Barophobia
• Fear of Books – Bibliophobia
• Fear of Snow – Chionophobia
• Fear of Dogs – Cynophobia

Steps to Overcome Fear

Identifying your fears, their causes, and their consequences is very important as it can help you overcome them and become successful in life. A person who fears something finds it difficult to deal with everyday situations. Imagine you have Acrophobia or fear of heights and your office is located on the 40th floor of a building. Will you be able to concentrate on your work? Don’t need to panic, as we will provide you with some easy steps to overcome fear.

• Identify Your Fear

Start by identifying your fear, its causes, and what triggers it. What is your fear? Heights? Water? Insects? Whatever it is, talk to yourself about it and understand how you react when you face your fear.

• Challenge Your Thoughts

Our thoughts play an important role in fueling fear. Often, our fearful thoughts are exaggerated or irrational. Challenge these thoughts by asking yourself: How realistic is this fear? What’s the evidence to support this thought? 

• Relaxation Techniques

Fight or flight is the immediate response when we face our fear. This is a natural response. Simple techniques like deep breathing, meditation, and progressive muscle relaxation can help calm your body and mind, making it easier to think clearly and rationally.

• Graduation Exposure

Pushing yourself in a controlled and safe way can be a great way to overcome your fear. A person who fears heights can overcome his fear by watching videos of high places. Then progress to visiting a low balcony, and eventually working your way up to higher heights.

• Positive Visualization

How great will you feel when you realize you have successfully overcome your fear? Visualizing can help you take steps that can lead to positive outcomes. This can help build confidence and reduce anxiety.

• Reach Out for Support

Talking to a close friend, family member, or therapist about your fear can be a great way. Talking it out can provide valuable support and encouragement.

• Reward Yourself

As we make progress in overcoming our fears, it is very important to reward ourselves by staying positive and moving forward.

10 Motivational Quotes to Overcome Fear

Here are 10 motivational quotes that can help you overcome your fears.

‘The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear.’ – Nelson Mandela

‘You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you stop to look fear in the face. You must do the thing you think you cannot do.’ – Eleanor Roosevelt

‘Do the thing you fear and keep on doing it… Fear is a bully. A bully thrives on your silence. The more you cower, the more it swells. But when you stand up to it, when you seize it by the throat and say, ‘That’s enough,’ it wilts. It shrinks.’ – Rosie Greer

‘The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.’ – Franklin D. Roosevelt

‘Fear is a natural reaction to a perceived threat. Courage is the movement forward despite that fear.’ – Pauline Rohn

‘Fall seven times and stand up eight.’ – Japanese Proverb

‘I’ve missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I’ve been trusted to take the game-winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.’ – Michael Jordan

‘There is no passion to be found playing small – in settling for a life that is less than the life you are capable of living.’ – Nelson Mandela

‘Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frighten us.’ – Marianne Williamson

‘Do not let the fear of striking out keep you from playing the game.’ – Babe Ruth

Ans: Fear is a feeling of apprehension, anxiety, or dread in response to a perceived threat or danger. Identifying your fears, their causes, and their consequences is very important as it can help you overcome them and become successful in life. A person who fears something finds it difficult to deal with everyday situations. Imagine you have Acrophobia or fear of heights and your office is located on the 40th floor of a building. Will you be able to concentrate on your work?

Ans: Survival instinct can lead to fear. Individuals who are more cautious and alert to potential dangers are more likely to survive and pass on their genes. Fear drives us to react quickly to threats. This reaction is mostly of fighting or fleeing, increasing our chances of survival.  Personal experiences or learned behavior can be a cause of fear. A person with a negative experience with a particular situation or object may develop fear or phobia associated with it. This learned fear helps us avoid potential harm in the future.

Ans: ‘The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear.’ ‘The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.’ ‘Fear is a natural reaction to a perceived threat. Courage is the movement forward despite that fear.’ ‘Fall seven times and stand up eight.’

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Shiva Tyagi

With an experience of over a year, I've developed a passion for writing blogs on wide range of topics. I am mostly inspired from topics related to social and environmental fields, where you come up with a positive outcome.

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Fear: Definition, Effects, and Overcoming Essay

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Effects of fear

How to overcome fear.

Webster’s dictionary defines fear as “an unpleasant, sometimes strong emotion caused by an anticipation or awareness of danger” or “anxious concern” Fear is a feeling that causes agitation and anxiety mostly caused by presence or imminence of danger. It is a state or condition marked by feeling of agitation or anxiety. It can also be described as a feeling of disquiet. Fear is an abstract concept and may have different meanings. Holder (2007) adds that fear is more pervasive when there is lack of faith that we have greater significance in the universe than what we own or how others perceive us.

Fear is manifested in many ways in human beings. It may manifest as showing signs of withdrawing or by cowering. But the most profound manifestation of fear is anger and hatred. People acts out their insecurity as anger which shows that they are the most fearful people.

Effects of fear have been documented in many studies. Fear has been documented to case mind paralyses, heart attacks and closure of fallopian tube due to fear of pain during child birth (Jim Rohn, 2004), describes fear, indifference, indecision, doubt, worry and timidness as the five greatest enemies within us which can destroy our lives completely. Fear may manifest itself in physical short term effects or affect your whole life. It will affect both he physiology of the body and the brain. Fear generates stress which manifests itself physically in many signs physically and emotionally. It causes judgmental errors and affects our reasoning that most of time when we are in a fearful situation; we tend to take the wrong action.

According to Sidney B., (1988), fear is a great paralyzer. It will keep you from making positive changes in your life and thus retard your recovery from depression. He continues to argue that fear persuades you to set easier goals and do less than your capability. It will also cause internal defense system fooling you that you have good reasons not to change. Fear of failure reduces the available alternatives you can pursue because you cannot stand by the outcome of what you do. You always feel that you cannot succeed in anything you try. It will keep you away from seeking help because you don’t want others to see you as a failure. Fear has been identified by psychologist as what causes people to give up when they are one step short to their goal. It will keep you stuck or make you develop unhealthy habits and behavior problems. Most of all fear keeps many people from taking risks.

Rim Rohn, (2004), argues that we are not born with courage, neither are we born with fear. He argues that some of our fears are brought on by our own experiences by what someone has told us or what we read in papers and books. Sri Swami Sivananda, (2007), describes fear as an illusion that cannot live. He suggests that to overcome fear we should always feel the presence of a Supreme Being watching us, by meditating and developing positive thoughts all the time. We should devote ourselves to eradicating fear. Since we have seen that fear is developed within our minds, it can also be eradicated within our mind and hence it is just a matter of reconditioning our minds that will help us overcome fear. It is also suggesting that we should share with others our fears. In this way they will help us find solutions to the cause of fears. President Roosevelt said, “We have nothing to fear but the fear itself” hence fearing fear starts and ends with us.

Holder P. (2007): FEAR… YOUR WORST ENEMY . Web.

Rohn, J., (2004). Build courage to face the enemies within. Web.

Sidney S., (1998). Getting Unstuck: Breaking through Your Barriers to Change . Web.

Sri Sivanand, S. (2007). The Divine Life Society: How to overcome fear. Web.

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The 7 Skills Necessary to Overcome Fear

Fear is the ultimate form of emotional baggage..

Posted January 10, 2021 | Reviewed by Kaja Perina

• What Is Fear?
• Take our Generalized Anxiety Disorder Test
• Find counselling to combat fear and anxiety

Emotional baggage comes in many forms and can affect many areas of your life. It can creep into relationships, career , parenting , achievement and even the way that you manage your health.

The ultimate whammy that emotional baggage brings to the table is fear . Huge, in your way of getting anything done kind of fear. Because what baggage does is tell you that you are not capable. You are no good. You are too fat. You are unlovable. You are damaged somehow. You are not smart enough, others are better than you.

These messages all bring about the bottom line of keeping you afraid of trying things or putting yourself out there. This is because you believe the messages are correct and that you will fall flat on your face in some way. That failure will make you a laughingstock and people will say “I told you so”.

Sometimes fear can be healthy and keeps you safe. Staying in safe city zones or in lighted areas is a form of a healthy preventative fear. Remaining stuck in a bad relationship, bad job or some other unhealthy situation is an example of bad fear.

Maybe you aren’t in a bad situation but you would like to change your situation and something is holding you back. That something is usually fear. That fear comes from someplace inside you that is screaming don’t be stupid, you can’t do that!!

But you have no proof that you can’t do it. You are only hearing your fear talking and that fear is coming from some old, outdated and incorrect message stored in the archives of your brain.

Let this be the year you clean out all those old messages. Test them out to see which ones hold water. I bet not many. The fear can be so great you are afraid to eliminate it, believing that it serves you in some way. Just like any other kind of clutter, we think we may need it someday. Maybe you think it is keeping you safe. But what it is really doing is keeping you limited.

So, what to do with these old fears and messages?

Bring them out in the open. Invite them in for a little chat. What is your biggest challenge right now in life? Associate whatever fear and negative messaging comes with it. You don’t need to look at them all at once, when you start breaking them down you will see that some will go away naturally. The worst thing you can do is ignore them. If it feels like too much just sit with the thoughts for a bit without demanding change. Get comfortable with them so you can spend some time.

Everyone has fear. It is how you deal with it that matters. Allowing it to limit you is a life suck. Seeing it as a challenge that needs to be overcome and making a plan for it empowers you and puts you in control of your life.

It is not enough to say, "I am afraid of that". You have to look at why you are afraid and what it would take to not be afraid. You can break it into baby steps that match your comfort level of change.

The biggest step is to see fear as baggage and not as a rightful appendage. Those negative and fearful ideas came from somewhere, it is your job to determine where so that you can go about eliminating them.

Eliminating Fear Involves Learning These 7 Skills:

• Learn to trust yourself- trust that you will make good decisions, research and learn what you need and if you make a mistake you can correct it.
• Take ownership of your life -Taking purposeful action rather than reacting to events.
• Identify the components of your fear. (Rejection, failure, so on).
• Neutralize the above components. Know and trust that If one of those things happen you can deal with it or you can find help with it. Don't suffer it before it has happened.
• Build your self-esteem . Learn to like yourself. You forgive mistakes by others, why not yourself?
• Know that you can learn whatever you need to succeed at what you are afraid of- whether they are practical skills or emotional skills, you can master them if necessary.
• Believe at your very core that this can be done. This is not just for other people. This is for you. You are just as good as the next person.

Anything that you want or are thinking of doing can be done with some thought and planning.

You can still write your life blueprint knowing that you have some baggage to overcome and skills to learn. Some baggage will be in the form of fear and you can recognize it in order to work with it. Your blueprint will be a lot more fun and hopeful when you dare to dream big.

Dr. Audrey Sherman is a psychologist, author, and coach whose expertise is in helping people overcome dysfunctional patterns and emotional baggage in order to create a life of their own design.

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Fear Essay | Essay on Fear for Students and Children in English

February 13, 2024 by Prasanna

Fear Essay:  Fear is a natural, powerful, and primitive emotion experienced by humans, usually triggered by an unpleasant perception of danger that is either real or imaginary—fear causes psychological and, ultimately, behavioral changes in people.

Human beings experience fear as a response to a specific stimulus that occurs either in the present or in expectation or anticipation of a future threat that might be a risk to themselves. Response to any kind of fear varies from person to person.

You can also find more  Essay Writing  articles on events, persons, sports, technology and many more.

Long and Short Essays on Fear for Students and Kids in English

We are providing students with samples of a long essay of 500 words on the topic Fear and a short essay of 150 words on the topic Fear for reference.

Long Essay on Fear 500 Words in English

Long Essay on Fear is usually given to classes 7, 8, 9, and 10.

Fear, the quintessential human emotion, is an utterly unavoidable human emotion. The extent and range of fear from different things vary from person to person, but the emotion is the same. Fear is capable of causing psychological changes and, ultimately, behavioral changes in a person.

Humans experience fear as a response to a specific stimulus to a situation occurring in the present or an anticipated future threat that is a risk to oneself. The response to fear arises from the recognition of danger, leading to the confrontation of the situation or escaping the fear or avoiding the situation – also known as fight or flight response.

We all humans are programmed in a manner to recognize fear to avoid or reduce being harmed. Learning from the past about what can protect one in dangerous situations makes people capable of doing many things that one wouldn’t typically be able to or willing to respond to the threat.

Fear is broadly classified into two types, innate fears, and identity fears. Innate fears are the fears that every individual has on some level, and humans are born with these fears, which also serve as a kind of survival instinct. Humans develop identity fears as they evolve.

Apart from this, many people also fear love and connection. These fears are a subset of identity fears. As humans grow in their lives, they tend to grow connections with people, and these bonds become of great value to the person. Losing these bonds is one of the biggest fears of many.

Sometimes fear originates from real threats, but it can also originate from imagined danger – which makes fear experienced by people either rational or irrational. Rational fear is the fear of something that is real – occurring from something entirely possible or will occur. Fear of mortality is an example of a rational fear as we humans are immortal. However, irrational fears are necessarily implausible, but the fear arises from a real place in the psyche.

In some people, fear is also a response to mental health conditions such as anxiety disorders, panic attacks, phobias, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Phobia is an irrational or extreme or aversion of something. An aspect of anxiety disorder can be the tendency to develop a fear of fear.

Many people confuse fear of phobias. Fears are typical responses to objects or events. Still, fear becomes a phobia when the fear interferes with functioning correctly and maintains a consistent quality of life. Fear in humans involves a biochemical response to the situation as well as a high individual emotional response.

Fear is an emotion experienced in the mind, but it triggers some strong physical reaction in one’s body. As soon as one’s body recognizes fear, the brain starts working, alerting the nervous system, which sets the body’s response to fear into motion. The human brain releases stress hormones like cortisol and adrenaline, increasing blood pressure, and adrenaline. One starts breathing faster, and blood flow in the body changes – blood flows away from the heart into the limbs.

Short Essay on Fear 150 Words in English

Short Essay on Fear is usually given to classes 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6.

Fear is one of the seven universal emotions experience by humans all over the world. Any fear arises with the threat of harm, physical, emotional, or psychological – from a real or imaginary situation.

Usually perceived as a negative emotion, fear can also be positive and healthy. Fear serves as a survival instinct helping humans in recognizing situations that can be harmful or dangerous.

Fear makes one foggy and makes it impossible to think clearly or make the correct decision. However, some people enjoy fear and gain pleasure due to the adrenaline rush experienced in some situations.

Fear will hold one back from achieving victories and significant accomplishments. Everything that one does in life will strike a little bit of fear in their hearts; however, overcoming the fear and giving one’s best is the most satisfying feeling. Don’t let your fears stop you from fulfilling your dreams.

10 Lines on Fear Essay in English

1. Researches have shown that humans can smell others’ fear and react to each other’s scents. 2. One can inherit fear from their parents or grandparents just like any other genetic trait. 3. We humans aren’t born with most of the fears; fear is often learned from knowledge and experience. 4. Fear is the opposite of love as the brain releases chemical oxytocin when in love, which helps overcome learned fears. 5. Sleep offers a unique state in which selected fears can be eliminated. 6. One big scary event in one’s life is not what causes fear; instead, it is a mixture of environment and genetics. 7. Fear can become extinct by associating non-fearful memories with the event. 8. Stress hormones released by humans helps in enhancing the extinction of fear. 9. Some people associate fears with pleasure – the thrill of the experience doesn’t end with the process’s end. 10. Fear can make one foggy making it difficult to make the right decision or think clearly.

FAQ’s on Fear Essay

Question 1.  Why do we experience fear?

Answer: Fear is an unavoidable feeling that is experienced by all. Fear is programmed into humans’ nervous system, and it works like a response to the perception of danger.

Question 2. Is it necessary to experience fear?

Answer: Fear helps in protecting us. Humans are equipped with survival and instinct, which is a response to the sense of danger or an unsafe feeling.

Question 3.  How can fear be avoided?

Answer: Talking about your fear, imagining the worst that could happen, distracting oneself with happy thoughts, and clearing out the mind by taking time in understanding what is causing the fear and anxiety.

Question 4. What are a few most common fears of humans?

Answer: Fear of height, fear of the dark, fear of closed spaces, fear of insects, fear of blood, fear of the violent weather, fear of dying are a few most common types of fear experienced by people.

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How to Face Your Fears When You Want to Tackle Them Head-On

Catherine Falls Commercial / Getty Images

Evaluate Risks

Create an action plan, seek a therapist, avoiding vs. facing your fears.

A little bit of fear is normal. In fact, fear helps you instinctively protect yourself from harm. Your fear might help you to recognize when you’re about to do something dangerous, and it could help you to make a safer choice.

But, you might find yourself fearful of things that aren’t actually dangerous, like public speaking . Your fear of public speaking might prevent you from advancing in your career or participating in traditions like giving a toast at your best friend's wedding.

If you really want to go on a vacation to Europe, but your fear of flying gives you pause, you might feel like your fear is stopping you from living your dream. If you find that your fear holds you back or creates bigger problems in your life, facing your fear may help you learn to better cope with the fear and ultimately overcome it.

At a Glance

Common ways of facing your fears are evaluating the risks, creating an action plan, seeing a therapist, and being sure not to completely avoid your fears. However, you may need to first decide whether it’s necessary to face your fear if it is not part of your daily life.

Sometimes, fear comes from simply not knowing very much about the thing you fear.   For example, you might be afraid of airplanes because it seems like you have heard about a lot of in-air incidents that lead to injury or death.

However, if you look into the statistics, you might learn that the probability of death on a U.S. commercial jet airline is 1 in 7 million (in comparison to 1 in 600 from smoking).

You can also learn more about what causes those bumps and jolts during turbulence on an aircraft—it’s simply the movement of air having an effect on the aircraft and, if you’re buckled in properly, poses very little threat to you.

Of course, less tangible fears, such as being afraid of public speaking, don’t necessarily have statistics to help you learn more about the risks you perceive. But you can read about other people’s successful public speaking ventures, or learn more about the successful public speaking strategies, to help you feel more confident.

Keep in mind that just because something feels scary, it doesn’t mean it’s actually risky. Educate yourself about the facts and the risks you actually face by doing the things that scare you.

The key to facing your fears is to take one small step at a time. Going too fast or doing something too scary before you are ready can backfire.

But it’s also important to keep moving forward. A moderate amount of anxiety is OK. Don’t wait for your anxiety to disappear before taking a step forward, or you may find yourself waiting for a change that isn't going to come on its own.

The best way to create an action plan is to create a fear hierarchy made up of small steps. Here’s an example of how someone might face the fear of public speaking one step at a time using a form of exposure therapy:

• Stand in front of a mirror and give a two-minute talk.
• Record yourself giving a talk and watch it back.
• Practice the talk in front of a partner.
• Practice the talk in front of a partner and family member.
• Practice the talk in front of a partner, family member, and one friend.
• Practice the talk in front of a partner, family member, and two friends.
• Give the talk in a meeting at work.

In some cases, virtual reality treatment may be an option to provide exposure therapy. The treatment has shown promise in treating post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

If your fears are debilitating, you aren’t having much success facing them on your own, or your fear is related to a specific health condition, like an eating disorder, social anxiety disorder, or PTSD, you can seek the help of a trusted mental health professional. If you have a specific phobia , which is a persistent, diagnosable anxiety disorder, you may not feel prepared to conquer your fears on your own.

A cognitive behavioral therapist can help desensitize you to your fears one small step at a time. Most mental health professionals are comfortable treating a variety of fears and phobias ranging from the fear of public speaking to arachnophobia.

Treatment may involve talking about the thing that scares you, practicing relaxation strategies, and managing your anxiety as you face your fears head-on. A therapist can help you go at a pace that is comfortable and healthy for you.

Fear-facing treatment may include:

• Acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) : ACT involves accepting your fears in order to make them less threatening and less impactful on your life.
• Exposure therapy (immersion therapy) : The underlying principle of exposure therapy is that through practice and experience, you will become more comfortable in situations that you would otherwise avoid.
• Psychoanalytic theory : Psychoanalysis aims to cure the fear or phobia by rooting out and solving the original conflict.

While avoiding the situations you fear might make you feel better in the short term, avoidance can cause increased anxiety in the long term. When you completely avoid your fears, you teach your amygdala (the fear center in your brain) that you can't handle them.

On the contrary, gradually facing your fears, in small doses that don't overwhelm you, may help decrease anxiety "habituating" your amygdala, or letting your brain become accustomed to the fear.

According to an animal study published in the journal Science , the brain has to experience repeated exposure to fear in order to get over it. Researchers placed rodents in a small box and gave them a mild shock. Then, over a long period, they place the same rodents in a box without administering shocks. At first, the mice froze but with repeated exposure, they were able to relax.

While animal research isn't directly applicable to humans, the thought behind facing your fears aims to achieve a similar outcome.

Should You Face Your Fear?

You don’t need to conquer every fear you have. A fear of tsunamis may not be disruptive to your everyday life if you live 1,000 miles away from the ocean. But it may be a problem if you live on the coast and panic every time you hear about earthquakes, storms, or high tides because you think you might be in danger, or you avoid going on a vacation you'd otherwise enjoy in an effort to avoid getting close to open water.

Have an internal conversation with yourself about what your fears are stopping you from doing, and consider whether it’s a problem that you need to confront. Are your fears causing you to lead a less fulfilling life than the one you hoped for?

• Consider the pros and cons of not facing your fear. Write those down.
• Identify the pros and cons of tackling your fears head-on.
• Write down what you might achieve or how your life might be different if you overcome your fear.
• Read over the lists to make a clearer decision about what to do next.

Fear vs. Phobia

When determining whether you should face your fear on your own, it's important to understand the distinction between a normal fear and a phobia. When psychologists distinguish between fears and phobias, the key difference is the strength of the fear response and its impact on the person's life.

You also might watch videos about airplanes, or park your car near an airport in an area where you can watch flights land and take off. Learning more about planes and being near them may help ease your fear over time. 

If you can’t actually do the thing that scares you to practice, you might use imagined exposure. For example, while it’s difficult to practice flying on an airplane one step at a time, you might be able to induce a little anxiety by imagining yourself getting on a plane. Think about how it would feel to take your seat and how you would handle feeling the plane take off.

Both fears and phobias generate an emotional response, but a phobia causes anxiety that is disproportionate to the perceived threat so much so that it interferes with a person's ability to function. For example, while a fear of flying may make you anxious about an upcoming trip or have you considering an alternate means of travel, if you have aerophobia (a specific phobia surrounding flying), your phobia may impact your daily life, including:

• Spending an inordinate amount of time worrying about flying (even when a trip isn't imminent)
• Avoiding airports
• Becoming anxious when planes fly overhead
• Having an inability to board a flight, or experiencing a serious physiological response like sweating, shaking, or crying if you do board a plane

While treatment for phobia may very well include an element of facing the fear in the form of guided therapy, it may also include medication or alternative therapies.

What This Means For You

The best way to conquer a fear is to face it head-on, but it’s important to do so in a healthy manner that helps you move past the fear rather than in a way that traumatizes you. If you're having difficulty on your own, a mental health professional can guide you gradually through the situations that you fear, being sure to first work on the thought patterns that keep you stuck.

Seif, M. Eight Steps to Overcoming Your Fear of Flying . Anxiety and Depression Association of America (ADAA).

Clinical Practice Guideline for the Treatment of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. What Is Exposure Therapy? . American Psychological Association (APA), Div. 12 (Society of Clinical Psychology).

Pachana NA, Woodward RM, Byrne GJ. Treatment of specific phobia in older adults . Clin Interv Aging . 2007;2(3):469-76. PMID:18044196

Khalaf O, Resch S, Dixsaut L, Gorden V, Glauser L, Gräff J. Reactivation of recall-induced neurons contributes to remote fear memory attenuation . Science . 2018;360(6394):1239-1242. doi:10.1126/science.aas9875

By Amy Morin, LCSW Amy Morin, LCSW, is a psychotherapist and international bestselling author. Her books, including "13 Things Mentally Strong People Don't Do," have been translated into more than 40 languages. Her TEDx talk,  "The Secret of Becoming Mentally Strong," is one of the most viewed talks of all time.

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How to Write the “Overcoming Challenges” Essay + Examples

What’s covered:.

• What is the Overcoming Challenges Essay?
• Real Overcoming Challenges Essay Prompts
• How to Choose a Topic
• Writing Tips

Overcoming Challenges Essay Examples

• Where to Get Your Essay Edited

While any college essay can be intimidating, the Overcoming Challenges prompt often worries students the most. Those students who’ve been lucky enough not to experience trauma tend to assume they have nothing worth saying. On the other hand, students who’ve overcome larger obstacles may be hesitant to talk about them.

Regardless of your particular circumstances, there are steps you can take to make the essay writing process simpler. Here are our top tips for writing the overcoming challenges essay successfully.

What is the “Overcoming Challenges” Essay?

The overcoming challenges prompt shows up frequently in both main application essays (like the Common App) and supplemental essays. Because supplemental essays allow students to provide schools with additional information, applicants should be sure that the subject matter they choose to write about differs from what’s in their main essay.

Students often assume the overcoming challenges essay requires them to detail past traumas. While you can certainly write about an experience that’s had a profound effect on your life, it’s important to remember that colleges aren’t evaluating students based on the seriousness of the obstacle they overcame.

On the contrary, the goal of this essay is to show admissions officers that you have the intelligence and fortitude to handle any challenges that come your way. After all, college serves as an introduction to adult life, and schools want to know that the students they admit are up to the task. 

Real “Overcoming Challenges” Essay Prompts

To help you understand what the “Overcoming Challenges” essay looks like, here are a couple sample prompts.

Currently, the Common Application asks students to answer the following prompt in 650 words or less:

“The lessons we take from obstacles we encounter can be fundamental to later success. Recount a time when you faced a challenge, setback, or failure. How did it affect you, and what did you learn from the experience?”

For the past several years, MIT has prompted students to write 200 to 250 words on the following:

“Tell us about the most significant challenge you’ve faced or something important that didn’t go according to plan. How did you manage the situation?”

In both cases, the prompts explicitly ask for your response to the challenge. The event itself isn’t as important as how it pushed you to grow.

How to Choose a Topic for an Essay on Overcoming Challenges

When it comes to finding the best topic for your overcoming challenges essays, there’s no right answer. The word “challenge” is ambiguous and could be used to reference a wide range of situations from prevailing over a bully to getting over your lifelong stage fright to appear in a school musical. Here are some suggestions to keep in mind when selecting an essay subject.

1. Avoid trivial or common topics

While there aren’t many hard-and-fast rules for choosing an essay topic, students should avoid overdone topics.

These include:

• Working hard in a challenging class
• Overcoming a sports injury
• Moving schools or immigrating to the US
• Tragedy (divorce, death, abuse)

Admissions officers have read numerous essays on the subject, so it’s harder for you to stand out (see our full list of cliché college essay topics to avoid ). If events like these were truly formative to you, you can still choose to write about them, but you’ll need to be as personal as possible. 

It’s also ideal if you have a less traditional storyline for a cliché topic; for example, if your sports injury led you to discover a new passion, that would be a more unique story than detailing how you overcame your injury and got back in the game.

Similarly, students may not want to write about an obstacle that admissions committees could perceive as low stakes, such as getting a B on a test, or getting into a small fight with a friend. The goal of this essay is to illustrate how you respond to adversity, so the topic you pick should’ve been at least impactful on your personal growth.

2. Pick challenges that demonstrate qualities you want to highlight

Students often mistakenly assume they need to have experienced exceptional circumstances like poverty, an abusive parent, or cancer to write a good essay. The truth is that the best topics will allow you to highlight specific personal qualities and share more about who you are. The essay should be less about the challenge itself, and more about how you responded to it.

Ask yourself what personality traits you want to emphasize, and see what’s missing in your application. Maybe you want to highlight your adaptability, for example, but that isn’t clearly expressed in your application. In this case, you might write about a challenge that put your adaptability to the test, or shaped you to become more adaptable.

Here are some examples of good topics we’ve seen over the years:

• Not having a coach for a sports team and becoming one yourself
• Helping a parent through a serious health issue
• Trying to get the school track dedicated to a coach
• Having to switch your Model UN position last-minute

Tips for Writing an Essay About Overcoming Challenges

Once you’ve selected a topic for your essays, it’s time to sit down and write. For best results, make sure your essay focuses on your efforts to tackle an obstacle rather than the problem itself. Additionally, you could avoid essay writing pitfalls by doing the following:

1. Choose an original essay structure

If you want your overcoming challenges essay to attract attention, aim to break away from more traditional structures. Most of these essays start by describing an unsuccessful attempt at a goal and then explain the steps the writer took to master the challenge. 

You can stand out by choosing a challenge you’re still working on overcoming, or focus on a mental or emotional challenge that spans multiple activities or events. For example, you might discuss your fear of public speaking and how that impacted your ability to coach your brother’s Little League team and run for Student Council. 

You can also choose a challenge that can be narrated in the moment, such as being put on the spot to teach a yoga class. These challenges can make particularly engaging essays, as you get to experience the writer’s thoughts and emotions as they unfold.

Keep in mind that you don’t necessarily need to have succeeded in your goal for this essay. Maybe you ran for an election and lost, or maybe you proposed a measure to the school board that wasn’t passed. It’s still possible to write a strong essay about topics like these as long as you focus on your personal growth. In fact, these may make for even stronger essays since they are more unconventional topics.

2. Focus on the internal

When writing about past experiences, you may be tempted to spend too much time describing specific people and events. With an Overcoming Challenges essay though, the goal is to focus on your thoughts and feelings.

For example, rather than detail all the steps you took to become a better public speaker, use the majority of your essay to describe your mental state as you embarked on the journey to achieving your goals. Were you excited, scared, anxious, or hopeful? Don’t be afraid to let the reader in on your innermost emotions and thoughts during this process.

3. Share what you learned 

An Overcoming Challenges essay should leave the reader with a clear understanding of what you learned on your journey, be it physical, mental, or emotional. There’s no need to explicitly say “this experience taught me X,” but your essay should at least implicitly share any lessons you learned. This can be done through your actions and in-the-moment reflections. Remember that the goal is to show admissions committees why your experiences make you a great candidate for admission. 

Was I no longer the beloved daughter of nature, whisperer of trees? Knee-high rubber boots, camouflage, bug spray—I wore the g arb and perfume of a proud wild woman, yet there I was, hunched over the pathetic pile of stubborn sticks, utterly stumped, on the verge of tears. As a child, I had considered myself a kind of rustic princess, a cradler of spiders and centipedes, who was serenaded by mourning doves and chickadees, who could glide through tick-infested meadows and emerge Lyme-free. I knew the cracks of the earth like the scars on my own rough palms. Yet here I was, ten years later, incapable of performing the most fundamental outdoor task: I could not, for the life of me, start a fire. 

Furiously I rubbed the twigs together—rubbed and rubbed until shreds of skin flaked from my fingers. No smoke. The twigs were too young, too sticky-green; I tossed them away with a shower of curses, and began tearing through the underbrush in search of a more flammable collection. My efforts were fruitless. Livid, I bit a rejected twig, determined to prove that the forest had spurned me, offering only young, wet bones that would never burn. But the wood cracked like carrots between my teeth—old, brittle, and bitter. Roaring and nursing my aching palms, I retreated to the tent, where I sulked and awaited the jeers of my family. 

Rattling their empty worm cans and reeking of fat fish, my brother and cousins swaggered into the campsite. Immediately, they noticed the minor stick massacre by the fire pit and called to me, their deep voices already sharp with contempt. 

“Where’s the fire, Princess Clara?” they taunted. “Having some trouble?” They prodded me with the ends of the chewed branches and, with a few effortless scrapes of wood on rock, sparked a red and roaring flame. My face burned long after I left the fire pit. The camp stank of salmon and shame. 

In the tent, I pondered my failure. Was I so dainty? Was I that incapable? I thought of my hands, how calloused and capable they had been, how tender and smooth they had become. It had been years since I’d kneaded mud between my fingers; instead of scaling a white pine, I’d practiced scales on my piano, my hands softening into those of a musician—fleshy and sensitive. And I’d gotten glasses, having grown horrifically nearsighted; long nights of dim lighting and thick books had done this. I couldn’t remember the last time I had lain down on a hill, barefaced, and seen the stars without having to squint. Crawling along the edge of the tent, a spider confirmed my transformation—he disgusted me, and I felt an overwhelming urge to squash him. 

Yet, I realized I hadn’t really changed—I had only shifted perspective. I still eagerly explored new worlds, but through poems and prose rather than pastures and puddles. I’d grown to prefer the boom of a bass over that of a bullfrog, learned to coax a different kind of fire from wood, having developed a burn for writing rhymes and scrawling hypotheses. 

That night, I stayed up late with my journal and wrote about the spider I had decided not to kill. I had tolerated him just barely, only shrieking when he jumped—it helped to watch him decorate the corners of the tent with his delicate webs, knowing that he couldn’t start fires, either. When the night grew cold and the embers died, my words still smoked—my hands burned from all that scrawling—and even when I fell asleep, the ideas kept sparking—I was on fire, always on fire.

This essay is an excellent example because the writer turns an everyday challenge—starting a fire—into an exploration of her identity. The writer was once “a kind of rustic princess, a cradler of spiders and centipedes,” but has since traded her love of the outdoors for a love of music, writing, and reading. 

The story begins in media res , or in the middle of the action, allowing readers to feel as if we’re there with the writer. One of the essay’s biggest strengths is its use of imagery. We can easily visualize the writer’s childhood and the present day. For instance, she states that she “rubbed and rubbed [the twigs] until shreds of skin flaked from my fingers.”

The writing has an extremely literary quality, particularly with its wordplay. The writer reappropriates words and meanings, and even appeals to the senses: “My face burned long after I left the fire pit. The camp stank of salmon and shame.” She later uses a parallelism to cleverly juxtapose her changed interests: “instead of scaling a white pine, I’d practiced scales on my piano.”

One of the essay’s main areas of improvement is its overemphasis on the “story” and lack of emphasis on the reflection. The second to last paragraph about changing perspective is crucial to the essay, as it ties the anecdote to larger lessons in the writer’s life. She states that she hasn’t changed, but has only shifted perspective. Yet, we don’t get a good sense of where this realization comes from and how it impacts her life going forward. 

The end of the essay offers a satisfying return to the fire imagery, and highlights the writer’s passion—the one thing that has remained constant in her life.

“Getting beat is one thing – it’s part of competing – but I want no part in losing.” Coach Rob Stark’s motto never fails to remind me of his encouragement on early-morning bus rides to track meets around the state. I’ve always appreciated the phrase, but an experience last June helped me understand its more profound, universal meaning.

Stark, as we affectionately call him, has coached track at my high school for 25 years. His care, dedication, and emphasis on developing good character has left an enduring impact on me and hundreds of other students. Not only did he help me discover my talent and love for running, but he also taught me the importance of commitment and discipline and to approach every endeavor with the passion and intensity that I bring to running. When I learned a neighboring high school had dedicated their track to a longtime coach, I felt that Stark deserved similar honors.

Our school district’s board of education indicated they would only dedicate our track to Stark if I could demonstrate that he was extraordinary. I took charge and mobilized my teammates to distribute petitions, reach out to alumni, and compile statistics on the many team and individual champions Stark had coached over the years. We received astounding support, collecting almost 3,000 signatures and pages of endorsements from across the community. With help from my teammates, I presented this evidence to the board.

They didn’t bite. 

Most members argued that dedicating the track was a low priority. Knowing that we had to act quickly to convince them of its importance, I called a team meeting where we drafted a rebuttal for the next board meeting. To my surprise, they chose me to deliver it. I was far from the best public speaker in the group, and I felt nervous about going before the unsympathetic board again. However, at that second meeting, I discovered that I enjoy articulating and arguing for something that I’m passionate about.

Public speaking resembles a cross country race. Walking to the starting line, you have to trust your training and quell your last minute doubts. When the gun fires, you can’t think too hard about anything; your performance has to be instinctual, natural, even relaxed. At the next board meeting, the podium was my starting line. As I walked up to it, familiar butterflies fluttered in my stomach. Instead of the track stretching out in front of me, I faced the vast audience of teachers, board members, and my teammates. I felt my adrenaline build, and reassured myself: I’ve put in the work, my argument is powerful and sound. As the board president told me to introduce myself, I heard, “runners set” in the back of my mind. She finished speaking, and Bang! The brief silence was the gunshot for me to begin. 

The next few minutes blurred together, but when the dust settled, I knew from the board members’ expressions and the audience’s thunderous approval that I had run quite a race. Unfortunately, it wasn’t enough; the board voted down our proposal. I was disappointed, but proud of myself, my team, and our collaboration off the track. We stood up for a cause we believed in, and I overcame my worries about being a leader. Although I discovered that changing the status quo through an elected body can be a painstakingly difficult process and requires perseverance, I learned that I enjoy the challenges this effort offers. Last month, one of the school board members joked that I had become a “regular” – I now often show up to meetings to advocate for a variety of causes, including better environmental practices in cafeterias and safer equipment for athletes.

Just as Stark taught me, I worked passionately to achieve my goal. I may have been beaten when I appealed to the board, but I certainly didn’t lose, and that would have made Stark proud.

While the writer didn’t succeed in getting the track dedicated to Coach Stark, their essay is certainly successful in showing their willingness to push themselves and take initiative.

The essay opens with a quote from Coach Stark that later comes full circle at the end of the essay. We learn about Stark’s impact and the motivation for trying to get the track dedicated to him.

One of the biggest areas of improvement in the intro, however, is how the essay tells us Stark’s impact rather than showing us: His care, dedication, and emphasis on developing good character has left an enduring impact on me and hundreds of other students. Not only did he help me discover my talent and love for running, but he also taught me the importance of commitment and discipline and to approach every endeavor with the passion and intensity that I bring to running.

The writer could’ve helped us feel a stronger emotional connection to Stark if they had included examples of Stark’s qualities, rather than explicitly stating them. For example, they could’ve written something like: Stark was the kind of person who would give you gas money if you told him your parents couldn’t afford to pick you up from practice. And he actually did that—several times. At track meets, alumni regularly would come talk to him and tell him how he’d changed their lives. Before Stark, I was ambivalent about running and was on the JV team, but his encouragement motivated me to run longer and harder and eventually make varsity. Because of him, I approach every endeavor with the passion and intensity that I bring to running.

The essay goes on to explain how the writer overcame their apprehension of public speaking, and likens the process of submitting an appeal to the school board to running a race. This metaphor makes the writing more engaging and allows us to feel the student’s emotions.

While the student didn’t ultimately succeed in getting the track dedicated, we learn about their resilience and initiative: I now often show up to meetings to advocate for a variety of causes, including better environmental practices in cafeterias and safer equipment for athletes.

Overall, this essay is well-done. It demonstrates growth despite failing to meet a goal, which is a unique essay structure. The running metaphor and full-circle intro/ending also elevate the writing in this essay.

Where to Get Your Overcoming Challenges Essay Edited

The Overcoming Challenges essay is one of the trickier supplemental prompts, so it’s important to get feedback on your drafts. That’s why we created our free Peer Essay Review tool , where you can get a free review of your essay from another student. You can also improve your own writing skills by reviewing other students’ essays. 

If you want a college admissions expert to review your essay, advisors on CollegeVine have helped students refine their writing and submit successful applications to top schools. Find the right advisor for you to improve your chances of getting into your dream school!

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How Do You Overcome Your Fears?

Amanda Gorman describes how she conquered her fears to deliver her stunning poem at last year’s presidential inauguration. What do you do to deal with your doubts?

By Jeremy Engle

Did you watch Amanda Gorman read her poem “The Hill We Climb” at President Biden’s inauguration last January? If so, what was your reaction? What did her words and delivery make you think or feel?

Her performance was lauded as much for the beauty of her words as it was for the then-23-year old’s composure on the big stage. Would you be surprised to learn that Ms. Gorman was so filled with fear that she had almost declined her invitation to perform that day?

What kinds of activities fill you with dread? Have you ever been overwhelmed with fear and anxiety before a big performance, presentation or event? How did you respond?

In “ Why I Almost Didn’t Read My Poem at the Inauguration ,” Ms. Gorman describes how she was able to overcome her fears and deliver a powerful and memorable oration:

It’s told like this: Amanda Gorman performed at the inauguration and the rest is history. The truth is I almost declined to be the inaugural poet. Why? I was terrified. I was scared of failing my people, my poetry. But I was also terrified on a physical level. Covid was still raging, and my age group couldn’t get vaccinated yet. Just a few weeks before, domestic terrorists assaulted the U.S. Capitol, the very steps where I would recite. I didn’t know then that I’d become famous, but I did know at the inauguration I was going to become highly visible — which is a very dangerous thing to be in America, especially if you’re Black and outspoken and have no Secret Service. It didn’t help that I was getting DMs from friends telling me not-so-jokingly to buy a bulletproof vest. My mom had us crouch in our living room so that she could practice shielding my body from bullets. A loved one warned me to “be ready to die” if I went to the Capitol building, telling me, “It’s just not worth it.” I had insomnia and nightmares, barely ate or drank for days. I finally wrote to some close friends and family, telling them that I was most likely going to pull out of the ceremony. I got some texts praising the Lord. I got called pathologically insane. But I knew only I could answer the question for myself: Was this poem worth it? The night before I was to give the Inaugural Committee my final decision felt like the longest of my life. My neighborhood was eerily quiet in that early morning dark, though I strained my ears for noise to distract me from the choice that lay ahead. It felt like my little world stood still. And then it struck me: Maybe being brave enough doesn’t mean lessening my fear, but listening to it. I closed my eyes in bed and let myself utter all the leviathans that scared me, both monstrous and minuscule. What stood out most of all was the worry that I’d spend the rest of my life wondering what this poem could have achieved. There was only one way to find out. By the time the sun rose I knew one thing for sure: I was going to be the 2021 inaugural poet. I can’t say I was completely confident in my choice, but I was completely committed to it.

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How to Overcome Essay Fear

Fear is common in every human being but what differs is what gives you the jitters. In students, assignments and exams can be a real fear which may lead to poor grades despite being a bright student.

However, there’re various ways one can overcome their fears and this article will go through some of them.

1. Believe in Yourself

No one will believe in you and your abilities if you don’t believe in yourself. This may sound cliché but it’s a longstanding truth. Therefore, it’s important to identify ways you can instill confidence in yourself and overcome the fear.

Remember, you are in charge of emotions and you choose what type of emotions that can take over you. Replace the habits that lead to fear with those that bring about satisfaction.

2. Find the Root Cause

In most cases, the cause of fear may be deep-rooted. In others, the cause may be clear. Regardless, you want to identify the cause of the fear if you fancy any chance of overcoming it. You cannot solve a problem if you don’t understand it.

Sit down and think through previous but similar situations where you felt the same fear. What led you to fear the essay? Was it a poor grade you got from a previous essay? Or you think you aren’t up to the task?

3. Try Relaxing Yourself

There could be other underlying factors that lead you to fear writing an essay or to complete your essay . For this reason, you may want to take the time to relax.

This you can do by taking a break from your normal routine and go to a quiet and secluded space to think through the cause of fear and how you can manage the situation.

Sometimes, fears are indications you need to take time out to relax. After the break, you’ll be surprised to see just how much you’ll be able to focus on the task at hand.

4. Go for it

Yes, go for it. Tackle that assignment or essay even if you feel intimidated by it. Fear manifests in people after going against the body’s wishes.

You see, the body is used to a certain routine and when this routine is broken, the body enters defense mode. In this case, fear is one of the ways the body will use to protect itself. Besides, if it’s still overwhelming, you can consider Online Assignment help .

5. Accept the Fear and Live with it

Sometimes, it’s better to accept the situation and live with it. By accepting your fears, you can plan ahead because you know exactly what to expect. Imagine the entire situation and start laying out a blueprint on how to tackle it in the event it manifests.

In conclusion, overcoming fears is an uphill task. However, you must understand that you are in charge of your destiny and shouldn’t allow your fears to control your life. In fact, there’s nothing that should make you think you aren’t up to any task.

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How to Answer the Essay Prompt "Describe a Challenge You Overcame"

Late fall is officially college admissions season! Some students have already sent in their early decision applications and are working hard on those regular decision deadlines, which means it may be time to work on your essays.

These essays from the Common App , Coalition App , or your prospective school’s specific format can vary in topic, and you may get to choose what you write about. But no matter the school or set of schools to which you’re applying, you will likely come across a version of the “Describe a Challenge You Overcame” or “Overcoming a Challenge” essay prompt.

For some people, the answer to this could be evident. But if you have no idea what to write about, the first rule is:

Don’t panic

So many students are plagued with questions like: What if I’ve never overcome an obstacle? Is my life boring? What if I have nothing to write about, and the admissions officers hate me? What if they judge me for what I've been through?

Deep breath.

All of these fears are normal, but everyone has overcome some sort of challenge or obstacle, whether small or completely overwhelming. By being authentic to yourself, yours will be compelling to readers and help them get to know the kind of student you are now and will be at their college or university.

You will need more than panicking to help you write an essay. Remember that everyone has something valuable to say, and the obstacle you choose will matter less than your ability to write about it and highlight your resilience.

Brainstorm an authentic but impactful challenge

The first thing you'll need to do is think through some challenges you’ve faced . 

A challenge can be as seemingly simple as learning to trust yourself after a failure in school or an extracurricular activity or as complicated as overcoming significant discrimination and prejudice.

You had to overcome a specific fear to succeed at an activity you love. You may have had to rebuild your life after losing a relative. Maybe your family moved, which shook up your life. Or, receiving one terrible grade or criticism led you to change your outlook on life and motivated you to work harder than ever.

Whatever the obstacle you face (no inventing, please), it should be impactful.

That means thinking of a challenge that changed something about you. As a result of overcoming this obstacle, you should have learned significant lessons about yourself or the world around you and made changes in your life.

Colleges and universities want to know what traits you possess that will help you succeed in college and your future career, so the obstacle you choose to share should have helped you develop one of your defining traits. They will care more about your reaction to this challenge, how it shaped you, and how you articulate it than what the problem was in the first place.

Generally, the obstacle you choose to share should also be pretty recent or have had a current impact on your life, rather than a challenge that happened when you were very young that doesn’t impact you today.

Begin at the end

The opening sentence of your essay about overcoming a challenge should be compelling and make the reader want to continue. It can be tempting to tell the story chronologically, but it can sometimes be adequate to start with the ending or a positive memory.

So, think about when you overcame your challenge or realized that you had improved after facing an obstacle. You might even share a moment when you realized your chosen barrier significantly. Recount this moment as your introductory hook in some way.

You can even preview the lessons you learned in your introduction. That way, readers already know that you will share what you’ve learned rather than just share a story recounting a terrible moment or difficult challenge in your life. This can also make them want to keep reading to see how you got to that place.

Share context about the situation but make it brief

You want the reader to learn about you and your challenges rather than overdoing it in detail. They don't need to know every step of the process or every player in the story.

Of course, you should share the context behind what happened to you that challenged you and changed your life or perspective, but you should not dwell too much on the details. Provide only the ‘need to know’ moments and how they led to changes in your life.

With this kind of essay, readers want to know less about what happened and more about what you learned due to your experience.

Focus on what you learned

Your reflection about what you learned due to your experience should be your primary focus within your essay. This section will help readers understand how you’ve changed after facing your challenge or obstacle to become the stellar student you are today. It can also show the maturity and self-reflection colleges may seek in a student.

By sharing lessons learned in this type of essay, you also share how you will contribute to any college campus with your newly acquired traits and perspectives.

If you had to move from one city to another, perhaps you learned to be flexible or met new friends who helped you discover your fascination with science and technology. If you faced bullying, maybe you learned how to respect yourself without outside validation and gained resilience. Whatever the challenge, the lessons associated with overcoming it are most important.

Share actions you took as a result of overcoming the challenge

To help readers understand how you overcame the challenge and how the lessons you learned tangibly affected your life, you should also consider your actions after overcoming your obstacle.

For example, if you witnessed discrimination at school, you could have founded an anti-bullying campaign or student organization. If you lost a family member to a specific disease, you may have volunteered with an organization to help fund research for a cure.

Remember, all of this information needs to be authentic to your experience. Even the most minor actions can be impactful. So, truth is always best, even if you just learned to treat your family better or significantly improve your grades after facing this obstacle.

Connect the lessons you learned to your future

Finally, you can strengthen your response even more by connecting the lessons you learned and actions you took with your future goals.

Think about how you will show up in college after facing this challenge. And consider how you are better equipped now to achieve your future goals because of the lessons you learned. You can then tie this into how attending each college will help you reach those goals.

Seek support!

Admissions officers should never be the first people to read your essay. Get help from a teacher or college counselor, your parents or guardians, an online college essay writing site like Prompt , or fellow scholars like other NSHSS members   before you hit "submit." 

Have them read your essay and provide you with constructive feedback about content and structure. If you're stuck, you can ask for some "overcoming an obstacle" essay examples or ideas from those who know you well.

Then, submit your essay and enjoy that feeling of accomplishment!

Answering the essay prompt "Describe a Challenge You Overcame" offers a unique opportunity to showcase your resilience, growth, and problem-solving skills. By focusing on the specifics of the challenge, the steps you took to overcome it, and the lessons you learned, you'll answer the prompt effectively and make a lasting impression on the admissions team.

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How to Overcome Stage Fear: Essay With Tips

Public speaking and performing are inevitable for people who want to share their experience, knowledge, and ideas with others. But not everyone has enough confidence and self-control to go on stage without fear. Even professional artists and speakers have trouble with stage fright. Dealing with this fear is difficult, but it becomes easier when you approach it as any other multi-step process. The first thing to do is accept the fear. You should understand that this fear is a normal part of your life, and you should not be ashamed of what you feel. Another effective way to overcome stage fear is to become distracted. Before going on stage, talk to your friends, call your parents, or watch an episode of your favorite TV series. Focus on something else but your anxiety, and your heartbeat will be back to normal. Your fear may come from a lack of confidence. The best way to deal with it is thorough preparation. You have to provide in-depth research on your topic and be ready to answer unexpected questions. If you’re going to perform, then you should take into consideration all the unexpected situations (such as a broken mic or power outage) and get ready for them. You’ll become more confident about what you are going to do, and your fear will disappear. One more alternative way to deal with stage fright is to learn a breathing technique. This doesn’t mean that you have to become a yogi, as many professionals use these techniques regularly to calm down: doctors, sportsmen, actors, etc. Among the most popular breathing techniques are equal breathing, abdominal breathing, and 4-7-8 breathing. They will help you to relax and reduce the influence of your fear on the nervous system. The next method to overcome your stage fright works for a wide range of daily situations. People frequently feel nervous about the things that they are unable to change, such as the weather or traffic. When it comes to public speaking, you can change your level of confidence, skills, and readiness. However, you will not be able to change the way your audience perceives you. They might not like your topic, tone of voice, or point of view. The only thing you can do is imagine the worst scenario. You are not going to die from one unsuccessful speech or performance, and you will not lose your job. The worst thing that can happen is that your listeners may not like your presentation. But your life does not depend on your success. This recognition will help you deal with the fear of the stage. The last, but no less important, path to your confidence is regular practice. You may not overcome your fear, but you will get used to it, at least. In fact, the regularity of your performances will not completely eliminate the fear and negative emotions you feel. But you may try to turn your fear into another strong emotion: excitement or enthusiasm. These feelings will be helpful and make you a more passionate speaker. Not only beginners have stage fright, but also skilled artists. You may overcome or tolerate it using various methods: accepting it, distracting yourself, growing your self-confidence, learning breathing techniques, gaining humility, and practicing regularly.

How-to essays (or process essays) aren’t frequently assigned to students. But their content helps students to deal with various life situations. Our essay on stage fear describes six effective ways to overcome stage fright and become a more confident public speaker. You can use all of them or pick the most attractive techniques and apply them in practice.

If you want to learn how to overcome stage fear, our essay may be the first step on your path to persuasive and stress-free public speaking. On our blog, you can take a look at many other interesting samples and guides. You’re welcome to read them and even borrow some ideas, but we kindly ask you not to copy our texts. It will be considered plagiarism.

If you need really cheap essay writing service , WritingCheap experts are always ready to help you. We’re available 24/7, so apply as soon as you need a helping hand!

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How to Overcome Fear of Writing

Last Updated: April 21, 2022 References

This article was co-authored by Melessa Sargent and by wikiHow staff writer, Hannah Madden . Melessa Sargent is the President of Scriptwriters Network, a non-profit organization that brings in entertainment professionals to teach the art and business of script writing for TV, features and new media. The Network serves its members by providing educational programming, developing access and opportunity through alliances with industry professionals, and furthering the cause and quality of writing in the entertainment industry. Under Melessa's leadership, SWN has won numbers awards including the Los Angeles Award from 2014 through 2021, and the Innovation & Excellence award in 2020. This article has been viewed 3,054 times.

Whether you’re writing an essay, a cover letter, a novel, or anything in between, having a fear of writing can make it hard to start. Overcoming this fear may take some time, but it can be done! By calming your anxiety and building your self-esteem, you can get confident in your writing abilities and reduce your unease about writing.

Building Confidence

• Remind yourself that you can create great work.

• Explaining things well (great for scientific papers).
• Having strong opinions (good for persuasive essays).
• Valuing your own skills (great for cover letters and resumés).
• Making connections while reading (good for novels and summaries).

• This is especially helpful for formats like essays, scientific papers, or summaries.
• Resumés and cover letters have specific formats to follow that you can find on Google.
• If you’re writing for a class, your teacher may be able to show you examples of what they’re looking for.

• If you don’t feel comfortable meeting in person, look for online writing groups instead.
• Check out your local community center or community college for groups like this. [5] X Research source

• If you’re in college, you can also visit your school’s writing center to meet with a tutor.
• If you aren’t writing in an academic session, your friends or family members can help you out a lot.
• If you’re working on a novel, try hiring an editor to give you feedback.

• You don’t have to incorporate every revision you get if you don’t want to, but it can be helpful to get feedback from someone with fresh eyes.

Starting to Write

• Research paper: Brainstorm ideas for a topic, do preliminary research on the web, write the introduction paragraph, create an outline for body paragraphs.
• Resumé/cover letter: Look up job positions, pick out keywords to include, create sections and categories.
• Novel: Write out general timeline of events, come up with backgrounds for each main character, pick a location for the story to take place.

• Write a rough first draft by May 2nd.
• Get feedback on the rough draft by May 5th.
• Edit and create a polished second draft by May 12th.
• Meet with the writing center to edit the second draft by May 15th.
• Revise and turn in the final draft on May 23rd.

• Starting with the body of your paper can actually make writing much easier, since you can use an intro and a conclusion to summarize the rest of your writing.
• Or, if you’re writing a cover letter, you might want to start with your closing paragraph first.
• When you’re writing a novel, working on the climax scene might help you get the ball rolling.

• Try not to edit as you go—this will only slow you down. Instead, have dedicated writing times and dedicated editing times.
• It may help to keep your goal in mind as you work. When you think about the big picture, it can help lessen any fear or anxiety you have about writing.

Expert Q&A

• Try not to expect perfection from yourself. It doesn’t have to be perfect, it just has to be done. [12] X Research source Thanks Helpful 0 Not Helpful 0
• Pick a relaxing area without distractions to write in, like the library or your room. Thanks Helpful 0 Not Helpful 0

You Might Also Like

• ↑ http://writing2.richmond.edu/writing/wweb/confidence.html
• ↑ https://writingcenter.unc.edu/tips-and-tools/writing-anxiety/
• ↑ Melessa Sargent. Professional Writer. Expert Interview. 14 August 2019.
• ↑ https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/career-transitions/201007/writing-anxiety-and-the-job-search
• ↑ https://openoregon.pressbooks.pub/wrd/chapter/overcoming-writing-anxiety-and-writers-block/
• ↑ https://goaskalice.columbia.edu/answered-questions/writing-papers-makes-me-anxious

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Essay on How to Overcome Exam Fear

Students are often asked to write an essay on How to Overcome Exam Fear in their schools and colleges. And if you’re also looking for the same, we have created 100-word, 250-word, and 500-word essays on the topic.

Let’s take a look…

100 Words Essay on How to Overcome Exam Fear

Understanding exam fear.

Exam fear is a common feeling among students, caused by the pressure to perform well. It can lead to stress and anxiety, affecting your overall performance.

Effective Preparation

Start preparing early to avoid last-minute cramming. Make a study schedule and stick to it. Understanding the material helps reduce fear.

Healthy Lifestyle

Maintain a balanced diet and regular exercise. This boosts brain function and helps manage stress. Ensure you get enough sleep.

Positive Mindset

Stay positive and believe in your abilities. Practice relaxation techniques like deep breathing to calm your mind.

250 Words Essay on How to Overcome Exam Fear

Strategic preparation.

Effective preparation is critical to overcoming exam fear. Create a study plan well in advance of your exams, allocating time for each subject based on its difficulty and importance. This not only ensures comprehensive coverage of the syllabus but also alleviates fear by providing a sense of control over your studies.

Maintain a healthy lifestyle to keep your mind sharp and focused. Regular exercise, a balanced diet, and adequate sleep can greatly improve your cognitive function and reduce stress levels. Avoid excessive caffeine or energy drinks, which can increase anxiety.

Mindfulness and Relaxation Techniques

Incorporate relaxation techniques into your routine. Mindfulness meditation, deep breathing exercises, and yoga can help manage stress and improve concentration. These practices foster a calm mind, enabling you to approach exams with a balanced perspective.

Finally, cultivate a positive mindset. Understand that exams are not a measure of your worth but a tool for assessing knowledge. Embrace mistakes as learning opportunities and view exams as a chance to demonstrate your understanding.

In conclusion, overcoming exam fear requires a holistic approach encompassing strategic preparation, a healthy lifestyle, relaxation techniques, and a positive mindset. Through these strategies, you can transform exam fear into a productive force driving your academic success.

500 Words Essay on How to Overcome Exam Fear

Introduction.

Exam fear can manifest in various forms such as sleeplessness, loss of appetite, nervousness, and even panic attacks. It is often driven by the pressure to perform well, fear of failure, lack of preparation, or high expectations from oneself or others. Understanding the root cause of exam fear is the first step towards overcoming it.

Effective preparation is key to reducing exam fear. It involves creating a study schedule, understanding the exam format, and familiarizing oneself with the subject matter. A well-structured study plan can make the task less overwhelming and increase confidence. It is also important to practice under exam conditions to get accustomed to the time pressure and format.

Mindfulness and relaxation techniques can be very effective in managing exam fear. Mindfulness involves focusing on the present moment, which can help in reducing anxiety and improving concentration. Techniques such as deep breathing, progressive muscle relaxation, and meditation can help in achieving a calm state of mind.

Positive Mindset and Self-belief

Maintaining a positive mindset and self-belief is crucial in overcoming exam fear. It is important to understand that exams are not the ultimate measure of one’s worth or intelligence. Fear of failure should be replaced with the understanding that mistakes and setbacks are opportunities for learning and growth. Self-belief involves trusting one’s abilities and preparation, and having the confidence to face the challenge.

Seeking Support

Overcoming exam fear is a multifaceted process that involves understanding the fear, effective preparation, maintaining a healthy lifestyle, practicing mindfulness, cultivating a positive mindset, and seeking support when needed. By adopting these strategies, students can not only conquer exam fear but also enhance their overall academic performance and mental wellbeing.

That’s it! I hope the essay helped you.

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