Fear often grows strongest exactly when someone imagines everything that could possibly go wrong. The possibility of failure can make an uncertain situation feel considerably worse than it actually is, sometimes stopping a person from taking any action at all. Dale Carnegie offered a genuinely different way of approaching a difficult situation in his book How to Stop Worrying and Start Living. "When we have accepted the worst, we have nothing more to lose," he wrote. "And that automatically means, we have everything to gain!" None of this suggests people should expect the worst or simply give up hope. Instead, Carnegie is arguing that actually accepting an unfavourable possibility can reduce the fear surrounding it considerably. Once the mind finally stops fighting the possibility of failure, there tends to be far more room left over to think clearly, make a real decision and start looking for an actual way forward.
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