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Facing Fear
One of the most beautiful sounds for me, is that of rolling thunder, followed by the sound of rain on the roof filled with the scent of the newly wet earth, moistness in a breath. The rain we have been searched the skies for, came at last, with a sudden storm, causing havoc. There are some weeks that glides by effortlessly and there are some that are filled with the unexpected. Some pleasant, some not so pleasant.
I look back over the last 11 days and wonder how it could possibly only have been 11 days? So intense, so densely packed, so pricelessly enriching. I was asked;" How do you face your fear?"
" I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain." Dune Book 1 - Frank Herbert.
What is fear? Natural fear warns us of impending danger, and would naturally disappear as soon as we take action to avert the impending danger. Our focus and energy is directed on the source of the fear. We become alert in situations of danger. However it should simply serve as a warning. For example if I feel fear before entering a place where I know there are dangerous animals, I will acknowledge the danger but I also know that if I continue with fear I will attract the very danger I am fearing. In nature fear sends out loud signals. To prevent this from happening, I stop and ask myself why am I entering this place of possible danger. I get my goal fully in focus and then I switch from fear to love. I am still alert but I am relaxed.
Wild animals will graze peacefully with predators until they receive a signal that the predator has switched into hunting mode. When you are relaxed you are more open to true signals. I have come to realise that no matter what outer form a fear takes, there is actually only one fear; The fear of pain. It makes us feel negatively vulnerable. We feel afraid that we will be hurt in some way. Whether it is emotional pain or physical pain. Often physical and emotional pain goes hand in hand because when we first experience pain, we also subconsciously experience a break in trust. (We were not protected from the hurt.)
Instinctively we want to trust that the world will not bring us pain. All our instincts and the basis of our will to live reside in the simple believe (trust) that it is possible for us to find happiness and joy in this world. However when we continually project our fear into the future through our creative imaginations, we become closed to the world around us. It is normal for us to feel anger in response to fear, a primal survival mechanism. If you feel anger you can be sure that fear is at the basis of it.
In the enclosed battlement, attention is focused on the perceived threat only, and the mind is not open to the whole picture. Our true intelligence lies in our ability to interact constructively with the world around us. Our fears hamper our ability to interact openly with the world around us. Thus it lowers our true intelligence. A high level of fear creates short-sightedness and tunnels vision. It not only cuts us off from experiencing the richness of the world around us, but it also cuts us off from experiencing true intimacy in any depth.
Intimacy is created when you reveal, expose yourself to another. You allow yourself to be vulnerable with another. This you cannot do if you close yourself in fear of getting hurt. In relationships it is intimacy that we all yearn for. To be able to reveal our innermost feelings without fear.
I came across a wonderful technique used by the Kahunas (Hawaiian) in getting rid of fear. "Fear is the expectation of pain, so its opposite is the expectation of pleasure…" Serge Kahili King All you do is instead of thinking, "What if something bad happens", think "What if something good happens." When you feel fear you are tense, by thinking about something pleasurably happening your body becomes relaxed. You cannot feel fear if you are relaxed. Just try it. Even if you know you have to experience some pain as in the dentist chair, by thinking about something fantastically pleasurable your body will become relaxed and the pain you experience will be less.
"If you face your fear good things will come."
In the last 11 days had to go into areas where there are a high crime rate. At first I felt fear, but there was no choice I had to go by myself with no protection. So I switched my fear to that of love and visualised myself as just part of the environment. Instead of experiencing that which I feared I experienced such warmth and co-operation, that I felt myself deeply enriched by the experience. I met the most wonderful people whom I will always remember with great fondness.
What is the greatest fear?
For each of us it is personal but for me it is not death itself, and pain while high on the list is not something I cannot manage. In fact pain like a pinch reminds me I am alive. Nothing to indulge but something I can dominant more than it dominates me.
For me the greatest fear is a meaningless life, a life without significant purpose.
I live in a world where that fear is very real and I risk manifesting my greatest fears all the time through the wasteful dissipation of my talent.
No one can judge and impose that purpose for another but what we can do is help those we love be true to themselves.
But what makes many a politician great or evil is their ability to charismatically manipulate this desire and fear within each of us and bend the collective effort toward their person vision of purpose; right or wrong.
However true purpose can be found and expressed in many ways, from our music and craft, our spirit of exploration and creativity to the bringing of joy to another and simply raising our children. The trick is being consistent (true to yourself) with your intuition in this respect and finding rewards in the efforts not merely successes.
Reviax
Thank you Reviax for your comment, it is much appreciated.
"For me the
greatest fear is a meaningless life, a life without significant
purpose.
The trick is being consistent (true to yourself) with your intuition in this respect and finding rewards in the efforts not merely successes."
How do we really know what our purpose is? What makes us think that our lives are meaningless? Yet, these questions plaque us all at one stage or another of our lives. Even the most successful people will experience this. Yet, how can we really see the meaning of our personal lives, with the narrow perspective we have? Each individual life has specific meaning, for which there is no substitute. Our lives are vast tapestries of interconnectedness. Perhaps we touched a life of another without knowing and set off a change that will effect the future. We simply cannot see all the consequences of our being. It is my belief that there is no life without meaning. As long as you are alive, your life has meaning. As you say, the best we can do for others and ourselves is to be true to ourselves, for then we are fulfilling our purpose. Some people's purpose is glamorous but for most of us it is just learning to be ourselves.
