5. How to Freak Out Without Losing Momentum in Your Business

You’ve made the decision to leave corporate medicine and start your own practice. It’s exciting. It’s bold. It’s exactly what you’ve been working toward. And yet… you find yourself hesitating. Procrastinating. Convincing yourself you’re “not ready enough.”

These safety stop moments are completely normal. In fact, they can be a valuable part of your decision-making process—if you know how to handle them. But when they go unchecked, they often lead to endless overthinking, getting pulled off course by other people’s opinions, and staying stuck in analysis paralysis instead of building the practice you envisioned.

In this post, I’ll walk you through a simple three-step framework to help you spot and move through these moments so you can cut through the noise, manage overwhelm, and take confident action (even if you don’t feel fully ready). Whether you’re preparing to leave corporate medicine or facing another major business decision, these tools will help you navigate doubt with clarity and momentum.

What Exactly Is a Safety Stop?

I learned about safety stops on Little Corn Island in Nicaragua while learning to scuba dive. When you're diving deep underwater for a certain period of time, nitrogen builds up in your body. As you finish your dive and start rising toward the surface, you need to stop about 15-20 feet from the surface and pause for a few minutes to allow that nitrogen to release safely. It's also a great place to check that you haven't left any equipment behind and make sure your dive buddies are with you.

I've noticed my clients do their own version of a safety stop in business as well. People naturally tend to pause right before they have to make big decisions, especially on the entrepreneurial journey when they're exiting corporate medicine.

It comes from a good place—it's your subconscious trying to keep you safe. But it doesn't always show up at the most opportune times or in the most productive way.

How Safety Stops Show Up in Business

Safety stop moments aren't just about leaving a job to start a new clinic. I've observed them at other points in my clients' entrepreneurial journeys too. For instance, one client had to sit with her decision to increase her prices before officially making the changes because she was worried it would alter her relationship with patients. Another client worked through a safety stop moment when she needed to confront a business partner about inappropriate behavior.

These moments usually show up with a lot of waffling—thinking about changing your opinion from one day to another. Should I leave? Should I not leave? This is terrible. This is amazing. Sometimes they manifest as getting into arguments with your significant other or beating yourself up internally: "How did I put myself in this position?"

It's a time period where you're especially vulnerable and sensitive to what's going on around you, all because you're about to make a big decision and your subconscious wants to keep you safe.

The Three Categories of Safety Concerns

Through my work with clients, I've found that safety stops fall into three basic categories:

1. Business Safety Concerns: This includes worries around money, career status, and professional reputation. Will I make enough income? What if this damages my standing in the medical community?
2. Ego-Related Fears: These might be fears around public exposure, receiving criticism from others, or the experience of being trolled online. What will people think? What if I fail publicly?
3. Concerns About Loved Ones: These involve worries about how your decision might impact your family, spouse, or children. What if this affects our financial security? Am I being selfish?

The Three-Step Framework for Working Through Safety Stops

If you find yourself in a safety stop moment, here's how to work your way through it constructively:

Step 1: Learn to Recognize When You're in a Safety Stop Moment

Remember, safety stops are unconscious—you don't choose to have them. They're different from a deliberate pause. They might pop up out of the blue and can show up as procrastination, waffling back and forth, irritation, confusion, or even getting swayed by other people's opinions.

When you start noticing these behaviors in yourself, take a moment and ask yourself: "What makes me feel unsafe right now? Why is this showing up now and not before?"

Don't let yourself indulge in confusion. Force yourself to give your best guess. Ask yourself: "If I had to guess, what do I think I'm doing or committing to that makes me feel unsafe in this moment?"

This doesn't need to be a long, drawn-out process. A five-minute brainstorm will give you the majority of the information you need. Write things down with pen and paper, or talk it through with someone you trust.

Step 2: Pause to Unpack and Acknowledge All the Conflicting Thoughts and Emotions

Here's something important to understand about emotions: they are messengers from your subconscious sent to try to help you. If you ignore them because they're uncomfortable or inconvenient, they linger in the background and wait until they have a chance to surface again (often at less convenient times).

The best way to deal with emotions is to give them some airtime. You can do this by talking to a friend, journaling, or working with a coach. Whatever feels most intuitive and comfortable for you, it's really a chance to acknowledge that these emotions are there and playing out.

If you're uncomfortable feeling your emotions, get some support. It gets much easier and less scary with practice, but the first time can feel overwhelming.

Step 3: Start Tapping Into Your Prefrontal Cortex and Evaluate the Situation Logically

Once you've figured out what's bothering you and what your subconscious is trying to tell you, you can start evaluating the situation from a logical, data-driven place.

Common Safety Stop Issues and How to Handle Them

• Other People's Opinions Driving Your Safety Stop

 If you find that other people's opinions are really driving your hesitation, consider flipping the script. Ask yourself: "That person was giving me advice on how to live my life. Do I want that person's life and their values? Because if you don't, don't take their advice."

This comes up a lot in the entrepreneurial journey, where employed people will tell you the "correct" way to do things based on their own story of how entrepreneurship is supposed to go. Maybe they read about Elon Musk or Steve Jobs and cobble together expectations that they project onto you.

You're going to get lots of feedback along the way, and it's up to you to filter it by taking what's useful and dropping the rest.

• Feeling Confused About Direction

 For people who feel very confused and don't know which way is forward, I ask: "What's your North Star? What do you value?" I particularly like this question: "Imagine that your life were a multi-chapter book. What is the title of your next chapter?"

This allows creativity to start flowing and gets you into a less triggering mindset than trying to make the "perfect" decision. That's when your intuition can surface again.

• Procrastination Takes Over

 I often tell my clients (and myself): you only get clarity through action. Everything is a guess until you start putting it into practice and actually get data and feedback.

If you're feeling particularly paralyzed, here are two strategies:

1. Take the Smallest Baby Step Forward Your brain needs evidence of success to keep going, and the size of the evidence doesn't matter. You can start feeding your brain evidence by taking tiny steps. For example, after being sick with COVID, I had trouble motivating myself to exercise again. I started by just putting out my exercise clothes the night before and telling myself my only job was to put them on and go to the gym—not even work out. This hack actually worked because my brain could see evidence that I was becoming someone who exercises again.
2. Look for "No Regrets" Moves A "no regrets" move is one where, based on all the different variables and stakeholders involved, taking this action won't hurt anybody and might even benefit multiple people. For example, one client with staff communication issues realized she could implement weekly staff meetings—something that had been on the table before but had fallen off the radar. It was an action that could benefit everyone and move the needle forward without getting bogged down in individual conversations.

• Overwhelm Takes Over

When I experience overwhelm, it feels like having 20 characters from the movie "Inside Out" in my brain, all talking at the same time with very strong opinions, all wanting attention. I can't take any action or make a decision with so much noise.

Here's a technique I developed that works for both adults and children:

When someone is feeling overwhelmed and can't figure out what they're feeling, ask: "What are you feeling right now?" and make a big, long list. "I'm feeling frustrated, mad, angry, sad, annoyed, irritated, etc." Synonyms are fine, and you can repeat words if needed.

Then go back over the list and ask: "Now why are you feeling sad?" (or whatever emotion you're exploring). Let yourself share the story about that feeling.

When you ask yourself why you're feeling something, you're giving your subconscious a chance to voice a concern and convey a message. The best way to calm emotions is to make sure they get heard.

At the end of this process, you'll feel calmer because everything has had a chance to be voiced, and you'll see the trends of what the real issue is. It's hard to feel overwhelmed when all the voices have been heard and the most important issues have bubbled to the surface.

Turning Safety Stops into Stepping Stones

A safety stop moment in your entrepreneurial journey can either stall your progress or become a chance to address lingering concerns as you move toward your goal. Many of my clients beat themselves up when they realize they're having a safety stop moment, but I use these as opportunities for them to get more connected with themselves and listen to parts they've been pushing aside.

These moments don't always have to be big hurdles you grind through. There are valuable messages wanting to tell you something, and if you can find constructive ways to listen, you'll build a business that's more aligned with your values and how you want to serve patients.

The key takeaway is that safety stops are a completely normal part of the process and don't need to derail your progress. You can still achieve your goals, make the leap, and build the practice you envision. The framework above will help you turn these inevitable moments of doubt into opportunities for greater clarity and stronger decision-making.

Have you experienced a safety stop moment? Do you have a scenario that's been bugging you—maybe an experience where you got really overwhelmed or found yourself procrastinating or getting sidetracked by other people's opinions?

If you have any questions or want to share your own experiences, please send me an email to [email protected] or book a free discovery call with me by going to www.amandasabicer.com. I'd love to help you work through whatever safety stop moment you might be facing.