A Conversation for Fears and Phobias and How to Deal with Them
Fear as a broader subject
Koshana Started conversation Jul 31, 2004
Being afraid of buzzing, sticking, whizzing things can I'm sure be terrifying, but at least they are identifyable objects - "things" that require limmited coping tools to avoid or face.
Millions of people arround the globe in this age live with fear in a broader perspective. A general pervasive and ultimately paralysing fear of life and living, the world and people. They are not always as noticable as the shriek of wasp's potential victim or a person who leaves their lights on at night . . . but people living with pervasive fear will tell you how each day is a committed effort not to just hole themselves away from the world and hibernate . . . forever!
The permanently fearfull can also be the extremist types. Hiding for days and then stepping out and painting the town red, purple and neon green - only to slink away again to regroup till the next wave.
I was wet-nursed by fear. Both parents terrified of living resulting in addiction, paralysis and rash and sometimes devastating descisions moviated by the fear of "the worst". As a result I committed to living my life in opposition to fear. I most feared regret. So I lived on the edge, challenging fear in each moment and defying the odds, disproving my worst fears at every turn - mendacity, paralysis and ineffectiveness were just a few.
As a result I've lived an extrodinary life - filled to the brim with experiences (sure some I could have done without) but no regrets. I once read a quote - "Our higher self manifests in our lives the things we fear - so that we can overcome them and get on with the business of faith-filled living". I know from my experience that this is true. Ive watched in myself and others how the things they fear most always find them eventually - and they are either broken or made stronger by the experience.
Eventually however Ive discovered that living in "anti-fear" - mode was still allowing fear to control my existence. Determine my descisions, influence my journey. So for me now there's a new answer - Faith. No dont groan, its not a religious thing - exactly. Just faith in life and living, and faith in my own "knowing". Faith that my next steps will lead meto my next perfect steps, with everything I need to have learnt already in me. There is - for me - a perfect order to effortless living. Freedom for me has meant releasing myself from fear, and stepping into Faith - that all is on schedule and "no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should". I just show up in the moment, and do the best I can in that moment - the rest I leave alone, its not mine to worry about anyway.
In this way, I'm free of guilt, fear of others, fear of success or failure and just generally free to be, right here and now, the person who is truly me.
Just a thought . . . use it, dont use it . . . whatever.
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Fear as a broader subject
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