No passion so effectually robs the mind of all its powers of acting and reasoning as fear.

Fear does more than make things unpleasant; it takes the tools away. Under it your thinking narrows to one or two outcomes, usually the worst ones, and your capacity to act drains off while you rehearse. Anger at least pushes you somewhere. Fear holds you still and calls the stillness caution.

When you notice you have been turning something over without moving, name the feeling rather than the problem. Then choose the smallest action clearly available and take it, on the grounds that motion restores more thinking than thinking does.