Great reply. So, if I understand your reply correctly, you said that these are your helpful and unhelpful beliefs/attitudes: Unhelpful beliefs/attitudes: * I never really tried to look for answers, as I always felt like I gave up already. Gave up on trying to find answers * (blaming) fear of negative listeners responses * (blaming) fear for how people might think of me or what they will do when they hear me stutter * (blaming) fear that stuttering becomes a problem and needs to be avoided * (blaming) fear of new panic, and fear of looking insane in the supermarket Helpful beliefs/attitudes: * I accepted that I have this 'disorder' * face everything head first and embrace everything with open arms, with zero resistance, all willingly * everything I feared, I would go do immediately. No hesitation, no pushing anything back * fully accept ANY feelings that would arise * I would tell myself (or my fears): "*Give me your worst, now!" and mean it.*" * keeping 100% faith that all will be 100% fine, even though my mind/feeling are telling me the opposite I agree completely. Did I miss anything else? You said: * "*This on the other hand didn't stop me from still having severe fear or anticipatory anxiety regarding it all, resulting in sustaining my stutter*." * "*When I read your stuff, I feel that what I felt all along - that my stutter is largely fear-based*" The way I perceive it is, non-stutterers speak immediately whenever they have the intention to say words. In other words, they don't have a habit from applying unhelpful beliefs/attitudes to wait out speech (e.g., by halting the movement of speech structures). In contrast, people who stutter have rewired themselves to learn the habit of: * unhelpful attitude: needing to sense or anticipate if listeners are adult enough to not ridicule/laugh/think weird about me - in order to decide whether to hold back speech * unhelpful attitude: needing to [sense](https://www.reddit.com/r/Stutter/comments/129z9q3/tips_to_improve_stuttering_do_we_notice_too_many/) how fluent they are speaking in order to decide whether to hold back speech * unhelpful attitude: needing to scan for speech errors aka needing to anticipate stuttering/fluency in order to decide whether to hold back speech Scanning for or needing specific sensations, thoughts or feelings is not needed - to move speech muscles. So, it's not a fluency law (very important). In fact, relying on and blaming sensations, (anticipatory) thoughts and feelings will only lead to waiting out speech to move speech muscles, resulting in a speech block. If we simply: * wouldn't care about speech errors (*note: we normally apply anticipation or sensations to monitor how we speak, which in turn let's us perceive speech errors*) * wouldn't feel the need to correct speech errors * don't feel responsible to fix anticipatory anxiety e.g., (1) stuttering anticipation, or (2) anticipation of negative listeners responses * forgive speech errors (to stay calm and relaxed, instead of being mad at or feeling bothered about them) * don't rely on sensations, thoughts or feelings to decide whether to hold back speech (and instead, we simply say words immediately based off the timing of our intention to say them) Then we wouldn't do panic responses when experiencing anticipatory anxiety, scan for speech errors or apply stuttering anticipation to decide to hold back speech. Then this likely wouldn't develop into a stutter disorder and we may outgrow stuttering as an adult, in my opinion. **Is our speech problem fear-based?** Answer: yes indeed, anticipatory fear plays a huge role in it, but I personally wouldn't label our issue as a fear-based problem, rather a 'blaming fear'-problem and 'needing to reduce fear'-problem'. Having fear by itself was never the issue, rather the way we perceive/respond to it was the real disorder that leads to speech blocks, in my opinion. Another problem is that we blamed and were dependent on anticipatory fear so often, that now, we can't seem to remove it (because it's too hardwired) and therefore, we don't know how to move our speech muscles during a speech block whenever we experience anticipatory fear, right? How do you see this and what have you tried, with the goal of unblocking (or moving respiratory, laryngeal or articulatory muscles) while not being able to remove anticipatory fear? Answer: to answer this question in my own words, let's compare it to '*studying for an exam in a crowded bus with a lot of people that make noise*'. Most people are not able to study for an exam, if they are traveling in a bus while experience a lot of noise. How can we learn to study in a bus if we are too sensitive to noise and can't tolerate the noise? Answer: You already kinda answered this, because you said: * accept any feelings that arises * face head on, embrace with open arms with zero resistance, willingly * don't hold back based off of hesitation or pushing * tell myself: "Give me your worst, now!" and mean it **Conclusion**: By learning to be okay with the noise (in the bus) and not perceiving it as a problem, dangerous or a study disruption, then we stay calm and relaxed (because we can now tolerate the noise without blaming it or needing to reduce it), resulting in not holding back: focusing on studying. Recent studies show that 87.5% of people outgrow stuttering, whereas 12.5% continue stuttering. I believe that we may increase the chance to outgrow stuttering, if we learn the skill of: * 'learning to study for an exam in a bus' If people who stutter learn to tolerate: * anticipation thoughts or feelings from negative listeners responses Then we wouldn't need to (1) apply anticipation, or (2) sense how fluent we are speaking. And then we likely wouldn't wait out speech or hold back speech in order to firstly reduce these thoughts or feelings. Then we likely wouldn't hold on to the stutter disorder or maintain the stutter cycle. You said: * "*Keeping 100% faith that all will be 100% fine, even though my mind/feeling are telling me the opposite*" I agree with you. If we simply put complete faith in the feedforward system to move speech muscles by the instinct (automatically), then we wouldn't feel the need to sense or anticipate how fluent we are speaking in order to decide whether to hold back speech. Additionally, even if the outcome is negative (and is not fine), we simply wouldn't care and wouldn't feel the need to overthink or reinforce overreliance on anticipation or sensations (that normally causes us to hold back speech).