Have you ever had an experience that left you feeling frozen? Perhaps there was an important decision to make, but the idea of choosing either path felt dizzying. To understand these kinds of experiences and what to do with them, it helps to understand what makes a certain choice or experience feel so weighty — and to learn to differentiate between fear and anxiety, two words that are often used interchangeably but point to meaningfully different experiences.
A Personal Example
Many years ago, while vacationing in Mexico, I was reluctantly convinced to cliff jump into a cenote — a large, flooded sinkhole. Although there seemed to be little objective danger, as evidenced by the flocks of children repeatedly jumping in around me, I found myself immobilized by an unknown angst as I looked down at the water. Despite years of swimming experience, I imagined myself unable to swim back up. I even concocted the idea that a shark had somehow found its way into the cenote and was waiting for me below. After many internal pep talks, I finally jumped — rather enjoyed it — and did it again with newfound excitement.
What happened in that story is worth unpacking.
The Distinction Between Fear and Anxiety
From an existential perspective, anxiety can be understood as the dizzying or paralyzing effect of freedom, the felt sense that any number of different possibilities could occur based on what might be chosen. Fear, on the other hand, is how we make sense of that anxiety. It gives imagined possibilities a voice.
In the cenote example, anxiety was the feeling that arose as I looked down at the water — the uncertainty about what would come next. Fear was how I made sense of that anxiety: the inability to swim, the lurking shark. Because there is often comfort in the familiarity of remaining where one is, the voice fear gives to anxiety is often unpleasant or alarming.
What makes a change feel important is precisely this: the felt sense that any number of different outcomes could follow from what is chosen. Fear narrows that openness into something specific — and often something frightening.
Three Options
What can be done about the paralyzing effects of anxiety as expressed through fear? In the cenote example, there were essentially three options: jump into the water, don’t jump into the water, or try to understand what the fear is actually saying about the anxiety underneath it.
There has been a growing cultural narrative that places greater value on taking risks and facing fears — making “jump” seem like the obvious and more courageous choice. But when one option is assigned greater cultural value than another, choosing the less favored option can produce shame, as though staying put reflects a personal failure. From an existential perspective, no such value judgment applies. Sometimes remaining where one is represents the wisest choice available at that moment. Anxiety only informs the felt uncertainty of possible change — it does not assign value to the consequences of any particular choice.
The third option is perhaps the most interesting — and the most therapeutic. Rather than immediately choosing, one can reflect on what the fear is trying to say about the present anxiety. Fear, in this view, functions something like a signpost: not the destination itself, but carrying potentially useful information about the road ahead — alternative routes, pitfalls to avoid, possible delays. Understanding fear can help make sense of why something feels anxiety-provoking, and how to navigate that experience in a less reactive and more grounded way.
This third option could reasonably be called the therapeutic option. As one begins to understand the relationship between fear and anxiety, the experience can be named — and naming it begins to disempower it. In the cenote example, the anxiety never fully disappeared. But the paralyzing fear transformed into something closer to excitement.
If you’re having difficulty making sense of your fears and anxieties, or if you’re struggling to move through an important change, our clinicians would be glad to help. In-person in Denver and telehealth throughout Colorado. Call 720-675-7918 or request an appointment online.