Name the Fear and It Shrinks — On the Amygdala

Becoming the chairman of a listed company does not remove anxiety. Because it does not, I learned how to handle it. Neuroscience reports that attaching verbal labels to emotion is accompanied by reduced activity in the amygdala, the region tied to fear and anxiety — a phenomenon called affect labeling.

A brain in vague dread is less settled than one that can say, "right now I am afraid about cash flow." The reason is easy to imagine: nameless anxiety has no outline and is therefore infinite, while the moment it is named it becomes a finite problem — and finite problems can be worked on.

So the more anxious I am, the more I write: what am I afraid of, what is the worst case, and what would I do if the worst actually happened. By the third line the monster has turned into a task. The greatest danger in management is not the bad situation itself but carrying a bad situation without putting it into words.

What anxiety of yours is still unnamed?

What do you work for?