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Make 2025 the Year You Do the Thing That Scares You Most

What if the life you want exists on the other side of fear?

A few decades ago, a friend from the New York Democratic political world took me to lunch and informed me that she thought I should be on TV as a political pundit.

She had been doing this herself but was taking a job that would prevent her from discussing politics on television. She wanted to suggest to the TV bookers that I take her place. At the time, there was a glut of female conservative pundits, but not many from the other side of the aisle. She wanted me to help change that.

I could think of nothing more frightening than what she was suggesting. There was simply no way I could ever do this.

Thank you for thinking of me, but no.

People are often surprised to find out that I am terrified of public speaking and that I am a shy person. I hate having attention focused on me so much that at my wedding, I banned all toasts, except for the one I reluctantly allowed from my husband.

I don’t know what this is about, but it goes back as far as I can remember. It’s to a point that I think it’s fair to classify it as a phobia.

If I had to give a presentation at school, I would blush until my face was hot and purple and my mouth felt like it was stuffed with cotton. At a job out of college at a Democratic fundraising firm, two men I worked with nicknamed me “Helen Keller” because of how infrequently I spoke. (Pretty shitty, I know.)

I was always good with my little group of friends and was very outgoing in that context, but when interacting with people I didn’t know, I would go mute.

Over time, I became better at small talk—it turns out this is actually something you can learn to do—or interacting with people I didn’t know well. But even by my mid-30s, when my friend made this suggestion, I had not overcome my fear of being in front of a group or public speaking.

Even as I felt what she was suggesting was an impossibility for me, I made a decision to override my fear. I knew that so many important things in my life only occurred after I forced myself to push through my fear.

In my early twenties, I went on an Eleanor Roosevelt reading binge and consumed every book I could find on her. I was so enamored of the former First Lady that when I became a dog mom in my thirties, I named my beloved Lhasa Apso after her. RIP Ellie!

Her famous quote, “[Y]ou must do the thing you think you cannot do,” resonated so strongly that whenever I feel afraid to do something, I think of it.

Because of Roosevelt’s advice, fear became a bit of a lodestar for me. What I took from this idea was to reflexively move towards your fear, not away from it. I learned over time that fear always has a message for you. It wants to teach you something. And perhaps most importantly, beyond fear is where your treasure lies.

“You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face,” said Roosevelt.

So, I told my friend to go ahead and give out my contact information, thinking I’d probably never hear from anyone.

Instead, I received repeated invitations that I turned down, offering some lame (and untrue) excuse because I didn’t feel ready. Finally, I pushed through that bone-chilling fear and accepted one of the invitations to appear on TV.

My first appearance was on a Sunday afternoon, meaning almost nobody was watching. Still, the entire week beforehand, I was so anxious I couldn’t eat or sleep. I was filled with dread. I considered canceling so many times.

The day came, and I sat in a remote studio, hands clammy and heart racing, as I stared into the camera.

What the hell am I doing? Why am I doing this? I’m going to make a fool of myself!

I don’t remember what the topic was, who I was talking to, or really anything other than the intense anxiety. I was asked a few questions about a political topic, I answered them, and then it was over.

I couldn’t believe how simple it was. It was just like having a conversation. I was good at conversation with a few people, and that’s what I had just done.

As more invitations came in for me to go on TV (thanks to my friend who had given my information out to everyone), the anxiety would come up again, but I would push through it. Each time I made an appearance, I felt more confident, especially because I was receiving such positive feedback.

What was strangest about all of this is that the one thing that I would have identified as my ultimate fear—and something I believed I could never do—had turned out to be something I was really good at, and that miraculously became a two-decade career.

When friends would say, “It must be so scary to be on TV in front of millions of people,” I realized that I never thought about that. For me, I was just conversing with a few people about something I knew a lot about and had a lot of passion for: politics. (This was all before Twitter or social media, so I didn’t have to deal with the real-time commentary on my appearances until much later.)

Like a video game, I had to scale various levels of fear. After overcoming the fear of being on television, I had to push through the fear of making people angry. I had to push through the fear of getting a fact wrong, which, of course, happened now and then. I had to push through the fear of losing my job because I expressed an unpopular opinion.

Now, a caveat: every time you push through fear, it won’t always open up a portal where you find yourself in miraculous flow.

Sometimes, it will be exactly as scary as you imagined, or maybe even worse. It may even require you to keep facing down that fear repeatedly until you eventually learn how to metabolize it.

You also are not guaranteed success.

But you are guaranteed growth and insight.

For example, once I tackled my fear of being on TV, I had to face down my fear of public speaking. So I reluctantly accepted invitations to give speeches at the various events that columnists and political analysts are routinely invited to.

In addition to feeling fearful and anxious in the days leading up to the event, I discovered was terrible at public speaking, at least when it came to discussing the current political landscape. Once I knew this, I stopped giving speeches and put my efforts towards other endeavors. I also gained the valuable insight that you can bomb at something, and life goes on.

I urge you to ask yourself, what is the one thing you think you can’t do? What do you dream of doing but don’t because it feels too scary? What risk do you want to take in order to have the friendships, romantic relationships, career, or life you desire? Where can you be willing to be vulnerable, no matter how intimidating it feels?

Now, please take a step toward that thing and make 2025 the year you just do it scared.

This essay is adapted from a piece originally published in December 2023

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