Fear integration is not a passive acceptance nor a clinical desensitisation but rather a dynamic, relational and meaning-making process. FIT proposes that integration is achieved through four stages:
1. Name fear explicitly
Objective: Bring fear into conscious awareness and therapeutic dialogue.
Naming fear breaks its implicit hold and transforms it from a shadow into a subject.
Therapists invite clients to articulate fear in their own language, whether through metaphor, sensation or narrative.
Naming may involve identifying the emotion (“I feel scared”), the trigger (“I fear being judged”) or the pattern (“I always withdraw when I feel exposed”).
Therapists should use open, non-pathologising language. Validate fear as a legitimate and intelligent response to lived experience.
2. Locate its origin
Objective: Trace the roots of fear across FIT’s four domains, revealing its developmental, relational, existential and systemic foundations.
Intrapersonal origins
Explore early experiences, internalised beliefs, and attachment ruptures that shaped self-concept and emotional regulation.
Common sources: childhood criticism, perfectionism, shame narratives and emotional invalidation.
Example: A client avoids leadership roles due to a deep-seated fear of incompetence rooted in parental messaging.
Interpersonal origins
Examine relational dynamics, past and present, that reinforce fear of rejection, abandonment, conflict or rupture.
Common sources: insecure attachment, relational trauma and betrayal.
Example: A client suppresses needs in relationships due to fear of being perceived as demanding or unlovable.
Systemic origins
Map cultural, institutional and intergenerational forces that embed fear through stigma, injustice or precarity.
Common sources: discrimination, economic instability, systemic betrayal or cultural marginalisation.
Example: A transgender client fears accessing healthcare due to prior experiences of transphobia and institutional invalidation.
Existential origins
Identify transitions, crises or philosophical concerns that activate fear of death, isolation, meaninglessness or freedom.
Common sources: bereavement, existential questioning, life-stage transitions and spiritual disconnection.
Example: A client experiences anxiety masking a deeper fear of living a futile or unexamined life.
Therapists should use FIT’s domain map to guide exploration with sensitivity and avoid collapsing fear into diagnostic shorthand, and rather trace it as a layered, context-bound phenomenon that deserves full therapeutic attention.
3. Meet it relationally and emotionally
Objective: Engage fear with emotional presence and relational safety.
Therapists should encourage clients to feel fear somatically and emotionally, not just talk about it cognitively.
Use relational depth to co-regulate affect, allowing fear to be held, witnessed and metabolised.
Therapists may model vulnerability by naming their own fears e.g. fear of rupture or not helping, when appropriate, to foster mutuality.
Therapists should prioritise attunement, pacing and containment, avoid rushing to fix or reframe: fear must be felt to be integrated.
4. Reframe it as a guide for transformation
Objective: Shift fear from barrier to insight, from threat to meaning.
Therapists should help clients reinterpret fear as a signal of values, boundaries or unmet needs.
Use narrative reframing to reposition fear as a compass, pointing toward growth, authenticity or relational repair.
Integration may involve new choices, boundary-setting or meaning-making that honours the fear’s message.
Therapists should support agency and re-authoring, encouraging clients to view fear as a teacher, not an enemy.
Integration in practice
The integration process of FIT is recursive, rather than linear. Clients can oscillate between naming, locating, meeting and reframing throughout sessions as well as domains. The therapist’s job is to hold the map, control the pace of the journey and respect the complexity of the fear as both wound as well as wisdom.
Example didactic: Client-Therapist dialogue
Context: Client (“C”) is a 35-year-old professional experiencing chronic anxiety about public speaking. Therapist (“T”) is guiding through FIT’s integration process.
Stage 1: Name fear explicitly
(Objective: Bring fear into conscious awareness and therapeutic dialogue.)
T: When you imagine standing up to give that presentation, what happens inside you?
C: My chest tightens. I just…freeze. I keep thinking, everyone will see I don’t belong here.
T: So, there’s fear…a fear of being seen as an imposter. Let’s name it together: the fear of being exposed.
C: Yes…that’s it. The fear of being exposed as not enough.
(Naming shifts fear from implicit to explicit, from shadow to subject.)
Stage 2: Locate its origin
(Objective: Trace fear across intrapersonal, interpersonal, systemic, existential domains.)
T: When you notice that fear of being exposed, does it remind you of any earlier times when that feeling was familiar?
C: Maybe school. My dad used to correct everything I said, even tiny mistakes. I learned to stay quiet unless I was sure I was right.
T: So there’s an intrapersonal origin, internalised criticism shaping your sense of safety.
Do you feel this shows up in relationships too?
C: Definitely. I don’t ask for help because I’m afraid people will think I’m weak.
T: That’s the interpersonal domain: fear of rejection. And maybe, in your work culture, there’s pressure to always perform perfectly, that’s a systemic layer.
C: Yes, failure isn’t really allowed here.
T: And sometimes, when fear runs deep, it points to something existential, like the fear that if I’m not perfect, I don’t really matter.
C: (Quietly) …That feels true.
Origins are mapped with sensitivity across multiple domains.)
Stage 3: Meet it relationally and emotionally
(Objective: Engage fear with emotional presence and relational safety.)
T: As you say that, “I don’t really matter”, what happens right now, in your body?
C: My throat feels tight.
T: Let’s stay with that. You don’t have to push it away. You’re not alone with it right now.
C: (tears) It feels really young…like a little kid who just wants to be told it’s okay.
T: I can feel how much that part has carried. And I want you to know, I’m right here with you.
(Therapist models attunement and co-regulation; fear is held, not fixed.)
Stage 4: Reframe it as a guide for transformation
(Objective: Shift fear from barrier to insight, from threat to meaning.)
T: If we treat this fear as a messenger, what might it be trying to protect or show you?
C: Maybe… it’s showing me that I want to feel safe to be imperfect.
T: Beautiful. So the fear isn’t an enemy, it’s a guide pointing toward authenticity and gentleness with yourself.
C: That feels different. Like the fear’s not attacking me, it’s trying to keep me from being hurt again.
T: Exactly. Integration means recognising that, and choosing new ways to relate to the fear, instead of from it.
(Fear becomes an ally, integrated into a coherent narrative.)