Sometimes the best way to understand fear is to deliberately put yourself in a situation that scares you.
Not because you want to get rid of the fear. But because you want to discover that you can feel the fear and still do the thing.
That was certainly the case on our recent motorcycle trip to France. This wasn’t actually the first attempt. I’d actually had the Pont de Normandie on my Action Board for 2025.
It was one of those goals that I really wanted to achieve, but I didn’t quite get there that year. When I created my Action Board for 2026, I deliberately left it on there. Partly because I still wanted to do it, but also as a psychological reminder. There it was, every day. A visual prompt that this was something I wanted to work towards.
Click the link here for my Visualisation and Action Board blog because there’s something really powerful about putting the things you want to achieve somewhere you can actually see them.
Sometimes a goal needs a little time to become a reality. And that’s OK.
When we were in France last year, I had already decided that I wanted to ride over The Pont De Normandy – a large bridge over the River Seine. The weather wasn’t playing ball, and we had a deadline to be somewhere else. I didn’t want to be putting myself under pressure to tackle something in high winds and under a time pressure, so we left. And I’m glad I did. That was absolutely the right decision.
There is a big difference between choosing to challenge yourself and feeling that you have to prove something.
I didn’t need to conquer a bridge that year. This year however, I was ready.
The bridge challenge started before I’d even left England
What I hadn’t really appreciated until we planned the rout was that my bridge challenge actually started before I had even reached France. To get to LeShuttle, we had to ride the M25 and cross the Queen Elizabeth II Bridge, aka The Dartford Crossing.
So, there I was, still in England, already facing a big bridge before I’d even got on the train to France! The QEII Bridge was actually a really useful run up to what was to come.
It gave me the opportunity to get my head into the right space and practise exactly what I would later be doing on the French bridges.
I wasn’t trying to make the anxiety disappear. I wasn’t waiting to feel completely comfortable before crossing. I acknowledged the feelings, accepted them and focused on getting through one manageable section at a time.
Once I’d crossed the Dartford Crossing, I had already got one under my belt. I could literally say to myself: “I’ve just done a big bridge. I’m still here. I coped.”
That was useful evidence for my brain.
We then continued to LeShuttle and made our way into France. After the journey there, we deliberately set aside a whole day to tackle the bridges. It wasn’t just me who had to manage my fear either. My husband isn’t particularly comfortable with heights, so this was very much a joint adventure!
Bridge number one: Pont de Brotonne
Our first challenge was the Pont de Brotonne. My immediate thought was: “Blimey, this is bigger than I expected!” It was high, quite long, more impressive but also more imposing than I had imagined.
There is something about approaching a large bridge on a motorcycle that makes you very aware of what is around you. I didn’t try to convince myself that I wasn’t frightened.
I didn’t tell myself:
“Don’t be silly. There’s nothing to be scared of.”
Instead, I acknowledged it.
“I’m feeling anxious.”
“I don’t particularly like the height – but that’s OK”
My body is telling me this feels threatening…But I rode on.
This was me moving from freaked out to figuring it out. I didn’t need to have the whole experience figured out before I started. I just needed to work out what I needed to do next.
Bridge number two: Pont de Tancarville
Next came the Pont de Tancarville. Another bridge. Another opportunity to practise exactly what I teach. I used my usual approach. Accept the fear rather than fighting it, break the challenge down into manageable sections and focus on the bit immediately in front of me.
I also reminded myself of something really important. These bridges might look enormous. They might feel enormous. In terms of time, however, they are actually very short experiences. We’re talking about a few minutes. That’s it.
I didn’t have to enjoy or even like every second of it. I simply had to stay with the experience and allow myself to move through it.
Then we discovered there was another one!
The unexpected bridge!
We had been working towards the big one, the Pont de Normandie. When we checked Google Maps, we then realised there was another bridge on the route. A bridge crossing the Grand Canal du Havre. This one was a bit of a surprise!
It was shorter than the others, but it was steeper and was curved. Although it wasn’t the biggest bridge, it had its own little collection of things for my brain to announce:
“Wow! Are you sure about this?”
“Yes, brain”
“We’re sure”.
By the time I had completed that bridge, I had already experienced several different versions of the same fear.
I’d felt it. I’d named it. I’d allowed it to be there. I’d broken the experience down into manageable sections. I breathed – deeply. I kept my eyes up and shoulders down. Most importantly, I’d discovered again that fear didn’t have to be the thing that decided what I did next. I was figuring it out bit by bit.
Then came the Pont de Normandie
Finally… The Pont de Normandie. This was the one I’d been thinking about. The big one. The bridge that had been sitting on my Action Board and in my mind as the challenge.
But something had changed by the time I got there.
I wasn’t approaching it as someone who had never done this before. I’d already crossed the Dartford Crossing.
I’d crossed the Pont de Brotonne.
I’d crossed the Pont de Tancarville.
I’d tackled the unexpected bridge over the Grand Canal du Havre.
I’d experienced the sensations that came with being high up. I’d felt the anxiety. I’d coped with it. So, when I finally rode onto the Pont de Normandie, something rather wonderful happened.
I thoroughly enjoyed it.
Yes, there was still an awareness of the height. It wasn’t the overwhelming experience my anxious brain might once have predicted. Instead, I was able to take it in. It was an amazing bridge and I marvelled at it’s beauty. I even considered with awe at physics of how these amazing suspension bridges actually work.
I was riding across one of the most spectacular bridges in France on my motorcycle, and I was actually enjoying myself.
I had been micro stressing with each bridge that preceded ‘the big one’ so that by the time I got to it my feelings had totally changed. But even if they hadn’t, I had all the tools to use to help me get across in the same way I had with the previous ones. Any my focus had been about identifying the fear, observing it but not letting it control me.
So what does “Name It to Tame It” actually mean?
Psychologists use the term affect labelling to describe putting an emotional experience into words, essentially saying, “This is fear” or “I’m feeling anxious right now.”
Research into Affect Labelling has found that putting feelings into words can influence the way the brain and body respond to emotional experiences.
One of the best-known studies was carried out by psychologists at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). In a 2007 brain-imaging study, Matthew Lieberman and colleagues found that when people labelled emotional expressions with words, there was less activity in the amygdala and other limbic regions (a more primitive part of the brain connected with fight and flight), alongside increased activity in part of the prefrontal cortex involved in processing and regulating emotion.
Further research has looked at whether this could actually help during exposure to things that make us anxious. One study involving people with public-speaking anxiety found that affect labelling alongside exposure produced greater reductions in physiological arousal than exposure alone, particularly among people who used more emotion labels. (Interestingly, the effect wasn’t found in people’s self-reported fear, which is an important reminder that naming an emotion doesn’t necessarily make you feel instantly calm.)
The goal isn’t to get rid of fear.
Naming it isn’t a magic spell.
It’s about moving from simply being in the emotion to being able to notice it, describe it and respond to it.
Instead of:
“I am terrified.” we can begin to move towards:
“I notice that I’m feeling frightened.” The fear is still there, but we’re no longer completely at the mercy of it.
Importantly, the research doesn’t suggest that simply labelling an emotion magically makes it disappear. The effects are more modest than that.
For me, that’s the really important bit. The goal isn’t to get rid of fear.
The goal is to learn that fear can be present without automatically becoming the boss.
From freaked out to figuring it out.
I think this is where one of my favourite phrases comes in:
Freaked Out to Figuring It Out. Because sometimes we put far too much pressure on ourselves to go from:
“I’m frightened” straight to: “I’m fine!”
But that’s not always how it works.
There can be a whole journey in between.
Freaked out. What am I feeling? Name it. What is my brain telling me? Accept it. What can I do about it? Break it down. What’s the next manageable step? Figure it out.
That is much closer to how I approach driving anxiety with my clients. We aren’t trying to pretend that fear isn’t there. We’re learning how to respond differently to it.
The fact is fear doesn’t have to leave the room
That’s exactly what I did on those bridges. I didn’t try to push the fear away. I acknowledged it. I named it. I accepted that my body was going to produce some uncomfortable sensations. Then I micro-sectioned the experience. One bit of bridge. Then the next. Then the next. I reminded myself that the whole thing would be over in a few minutes. This is something I encourage my driving anxiety clients to practise too.
Sometimes we are waiting for confidence to arrive before we do the thing. Confidence doesn’t always work like that.
Sometimes confidence is the result of doing the thing.
Every time you approach something that scares you, stay with the sensations and discover that you can cope, you’re giving your brain new information.
“I felt frightened, and I did it anyway.”
“That was uncomfortable, and I coped.”
“My anxiety came with me, but it didn’t stop me.”
Those experiences matter.
From the M25 to Normandy
Looking back, I love the fact that this challenge started on the M25 and Dartford Crossing, before I’d even left England.
It was almost like the first chapter of the bridge challenge had been written before we reached the Channel.
The QEII bridge gave me a run up.
Then came LeShuttle.
Then France.
Then Pont de Brotonne.
Pont de Tancarville.
The unexpected bridge over the Grand Canal du Havre.
Finally, Pont de Normandie.
We don’t necessarily have to jump straight to the biggest challenge. We can build our confidence through a series of smaller or different experiences. Sometimes, what once looked like one enormous, frightening thing becomes a collection of much smaller things that we know how to handle.
That’s exactly what happened to me. What had once been one big scary idea had become a series of manageable steps. The final step?
I loved it!
You don’t have to wait for fear to disappear – because progress is what we do, not always how we feel!
Fear isn’t necessarily a sign that you shouldn’t do something. Sometimes it’s simply your brain saying:
“This is unfamiliar. Pay attention.”
We can listen to that message without allowing it to make all our decisions. So next time fear shows up, try something different.
Instead of:
“How do I make this feeling stop?”
try:
“What am I feeling right now?”
Name it.
Accept it.
Break the challenge into smaller pieces.
Then ask yourself:
“What’s the next tiny step I can take?”
You don’t need to feel fearless to move forward.
You just need to discover that you can feel the fear and do it anyway.
Sometimes, on the other side of that fear, there is a bridge you discover you absolutely love crossing. And perhaps that’s the real journey.
Not from fearful to fearless. Doing more, driving more, (in my case riding more), doesn’t make you fearless, but will help you to fear less and go from freaked out to figuring it out.