"Right now it's the most electric time. It feels like the old days again to me."

- Dan Wieden

Fear is perhaps the single most powerful inhibitor of new behavior. By extension, fear is what often inhibits growth. Because trying new things is scary. Especially when it comes to sustaining a business.

However, success in business, as many entrepreneurs know, involves taking risks. Taking risks involves overcoming fear in addition to careful planning and gaining a little bit of understanding as to why the fear exists in the first place.

Why are we scared to try new things?

The simple answer is, because of how difficult it is to predict what will happen when the new thing is attempted. Without a history of successes and/or failures, how does one conduct a proper risk/reward assessment?

A deeper, more scientific answer involves a small section of the brain (about the size of an almond) called the amygdala—a critical structure in the processing of emotions. The amygdala also influences certain functions of the cortex, which is the region of the brain where perception occurs. Fear, then, is an emotional product of perception – an emotion that feels real because it is perceived as such. (Perception is reality.)

Studies in perception have shown that the brain functions which occur when someone is looking at an object are the very same brain functions which occur when that person closes their eyes and imagines that same object. In other words, the brain does not discern between what is real and what is imagined. So, if perception IS reality, then something that exists only in the imagination is as real as if it were to exist in the physical realm.

Dan Wieden of Wieden+ Kennedy, the agency responsible for Nike’s long-running “Just Do It.” campaign, recently said, “When I first started in advertising, I knew nothing…Nike knew nothing. It was our stupidity that allowed us to experiment and do different things.”

Wieden claims it was stupidity that enabled his firm to do work for which he has received numerous accolades, including a lifetime achievement award this past May. But science says that it was a fearlessness born of an untainted amygdala. He hadn’t been conditioned by advertising “norms,” so, he just did what a child would do—he experimented. In other words, he tried new things. And, it worked out pretty well for him.

For every five business decisions you make based on what you’ve learned in the past, make one based on what you might do if you knew nothing. It’ll make trying new things easier and less scary. And, it’s a good way to turn the imaginary into reality.

 

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