This business is pretty exciting. Every day, we get the chance to create something that will affect people, make them think, and hopefully, sell lots and lots of stuff.

But the flip side of that excitement is something we don’t talk much about: Fear.

As a creative, I fight fear every day. Fear that I’m out of ideas. That my well has run dry. That I’ll never come up with anything again and will have to live in a refrigerator box. And when an idea does (finally!) appear, fear that I’ll watch it die at the hands of my creative directors.

Then there’s the fear that the client won’t buy it. Or fear that they will buy it, but I won’t be able to make it great. Fear that my ideas won’t do the things I promise they will.

Fear that I don’t know what I think I know. Fear that, at any moment, everyone will realize what a total fraud I really am.

But my fears seem kind of self-indulgent compared to what clients have to face.

Fear that we care more about awards than we do their business. Fear they’re supporting an idea nobody else will. Fear of too-low budgets and too-high expectations.

Fear of turning people off. Fear of angry letters. Fear of losing customers.

Fear that a bold idea and a total trainwreck look an awful lot alike.

I’m not sure how to make the fear go away. But I know I can’t let it guide me. Because when I do, the result is work that’s cowardly. Work that talks a lot, but says nothing. Work that’s just one more drop in the giant river of crap that makes consumers resent advertising.

The same thing goes for clients. When fear is the motivator, clients stop thinking like consumers and start focusing on proof points, stop thinking engagement and start thinking sell sell sell. And the result is work that covers all the talking points, but never reaches anyone.

Proof points don’t move people. Stories do. And if we tell them a story that resonates, they’ll love us for it.

We shouldn’t fear people hating what we create.

But we should be terrified they won’t care enough to bother.