Doubt: Is it a Form of Fear | Easily Explained

A few years ago, I was curious about the topic of fear and doubt. At that time, searching for an answer to this question was quite challenging because most of their explanation was difficult to understand. I remember giving up that day. However, through constantly battling my fear and controlling my doubts, I understood their relationship through experience. Thus, I want to answer if doubt is a form of fear?

Doubts are not the same as fear. Doubt is questioning the truth behind uncertainty. This means that whenever you face uncertainty, what’s causing you to think first before doing is doubt. Fear, on the other hand, is an emotion that can come from doubts. Thus, fear is a product of doubt.  

A few years later, I tried searching again for answers. Sadly, I’ve found explanations that are too deep that the majority will find it hard to understand. Someone who lacks experience in both fear and doubt might feel confused about their answer. Thus, I made this blog post to make it easier to understand. I tried my best to explain the topic easily and to give some examples.

Is doubt a form of fear?

Doubts can be a form of fear if it is used as a roadblock the things you want to do. On the other hand, doubts can be used as a logical means to measure your abilities which is important for success. Thus, doubt being a form of fear ultimately depends on the person using it.

By reaching this point, you probably already understand what fear is.

Fear is our reaction to doubt.

For example, when I was first making my YouTube channel, I felt doubt. I don’t know how to speak on camera, and I don’t know how to edit videos. I kept questioning my abilities as a content creator.

Now, how I react to this fear would separate fear from courage.

If I took the route of running away from my dreams like what I did a few years back, then that’s fear.

However, this time, I gathered some courage to finally try making my video.

Right now, I am regularly making videos on my channel, and I can still remember those times when I doubted myself.

Doubts, fear, and courage are all emotions, and we have them. There is no sense in suppressing these emotions because they will always stay with us.

However, it is essential to know that not all doubts are fear. That’s why I said our reaction to these doubts would separate fear from courage.

Questioning your abilities and strengths when doing something is doubt. It is our logical thinking or reasoning telling us that we currently have no ability to do something.

But that doesn’t mean that we can’t do it.

Doubts made me strong. It helped me build a beginner’s mindset when I was starting to make my Channel. It helped me learn everything I could to make my videos better.

It even helped me learn a lot of things about writing on this blog.

Doubt is your ability to compare your abilities to the challenge. If the challenge is too hard, you might feel fear, and if the challenge is too easy, you might not feel fear.

But if the challenge is difficult, it is crucial to know that fear is not always the answer.

We can use courage and try to learn new things. We can use it to prove our abilities. Fear is not the only option.

That’s why I firmly believe that fear can be a form of doubt. It is our reaction to having a difficult task. That’s the same with courage.

From listening to my story, you probably have a deep understanding of their relationship. That’s why I said in the introduction that I’ve learned this through experience.

Now, let’s talk more about the topic in the next section.

What comes first doubt or fear?

Doubt comes first before fear. We all have self-doubts but how we react to these doubts separates us from feeling confident or fearful. Always staying away when having doubts is a form of fear, while knowing that doubts indicate challenge or curiosity is a form of confidence. Thus, fear and confidence are the products of doubt.

You probably understand their difference and who comes first by now. However, I still need to go deeper.

While we know that fear, confidence, and courage come from doubt, what causes doubt?

Doubt is caused by questioning the truth behind uncertainty. It is a series of thinking or self-questioning that leads to doubts. When someone is questioning their abilities to do a specific task, that is doubt. It is worrying about our thinking, abilities, or what others think of our ideas.

As I said, doubts are normal.

We survived through times with the help of doubts.

To explain, let’s go back to our hunter-gatherer ancestors.

Our hunter-gatherer ancestors lived in a dangerous environment.

They lived in an environment where numerous carnivore, stronger, and larger animals were wandering everywhere.

Lacking strength, we learned how to doubt ourselves, and it helped us survived up to this day.

Imagine our ancestors not having doubts. If they don’t feel any doubt, they will hunt a lion alone.

Imagine the disaster it can do.

However, due to doubts, our ancestors learned the importance of preparation. If they have bigger prey, they know that they need tools or teamwork to hunt properly.

Is that familiar? That’s doubt.

It is doubt that forces us to stay logical. Remember that fear, courage, and confidence are emotions.

But we need logic. We need to find a way where we have to think to measure the difficulty of a problem.

That’s where doubt comes. It is our logical working for us.

It is essential because it helps us prepare. Much like my story, I prepared by learning how to edit, speak on camera, and many more things when I started my career.

That’s why I always say that we should not learn how to remove our doubts. Instead, we should know how to react to our doubts adequately.

Our doubts are there for a reason. That’s why we need to use it properly.

If your doubts prevent you from trying something new or learning new things, then most probably, you’re using it wrong.

From here, you learned the cause of doubts, the relationship between fear and doubt, to the products of doubts.

Right now, if you want to learn more about the topic, then I suggest you read my other post about doubt, where I dive deeper into the subject or why self-doubt can be good for us. Here is the link: Is doubting yourself really bad?