The Fear of Delight
"Ultimately, we know deeply that the other side of every fear is freedom." ~ Mary Ferguson
This month the concept of Fear continues to grab my attention. Both in the books and magazines I buy and random articles I come across online. It seems the universe has been challenging me to deconstruct this emotion over the last couple of weeks.
My mother, being the wise woman she is, has always told me that every action comes from a place of fear or love. That people's actions, more often then not, are generated from fear. John Lennon also said "If we cannot love ourselves, we cannot fully open to our ability to love others or our potential to create. Evolution and all hopes for a better world rest in the fearlessness and open-hearted vision of people who embrace life." ~ let me give you a moment to re-read that shall I?
In my opinion, fear is something we have conceived as a society. Once the idea or concept is there, it is not unthinkable, it's not unimaginable, the concept is stuck and re-enforced every day. Having the right job, looking a particular way, having the right relationships, the latest and most up-to-date of technology... and the list goes on.
Perhaps fear is an unconscious habit learnt from a young age. We watch our parents and those before us react or respond in certain ways. Again, it is all innocent and unconscious, we don't know what we don't know, and we do the best with what we have at the time. Don't touch that, it'll burn you. Don't get a motorbike, it might hurt you. Don't run with your eyes closed, that's just silly, and you could hurt yourself. It appears we've all been apart of a vicious fear induced society.
I am currently reading OSHO's book on Fear and if I do say so myself.. I think it's incredible. It shines a new light on a topic we seldom talk about, because as a society we refer to fear as a weakness. One point that has become particularly clear to me is that all fear relates back to death. It's not the fear of death itself, but rather what death represents.
Death represents time. A limit of time. So we rush and we stress. As though we are all ticking time bombs, we rush around like chickens with our heads chopped off, and complain there aren't enough hours in the day to do the things we love.
Instead we work endless hours in jobs we dislike, to earn money we can't enjoy, to spend on the house, car and gadgets we never have enough time to enjoy. And WHAM, before you know it, we're dead.
In our society death is absolute. Time is absolute. There is only forward and never back. When people leave us, we are selfish. We think only of the time we'll never get with them. Of the things they will miss, of the things we will miss. If we had only lived wholly with them, in every moment, appreciating them, we wouldn't have such regret and fear.
Today I read the quote "What you focus on expands" - for both positive and negative. 5 simple words that make a world of sense.
Recently, that limbo feeling has been coming and going, leaving me with that leach-like emotion of, 'I'm not sure where I'm going or who might walk along side me' fear. Perhaps this is why it's played such a dominate presence this year so far. But hey, I'm 22, so I'm sure I'll get by with the colours of the wind to guide me. By colours I mean OSHO of course.
" Procrastination is the fear of success. People procrastinate because they are afraid of the success that they know will result if they move ahead now. Because success is heavy, carries a responsibility with it, it is much easier to procrastinate and live on the ‘someday I’ll’ philosophy." ~ Denis Waitley
Fear is a legitimate thing and you cannot eliminate it completely. I think we can only grow to understand it better and adjust ourselves accordingly. No one is perfect and it is only through self awareness that we can begin to change.
I feel as though I may need to take some advice from Mr Snicket himself, "Do the scary thing first, and get scared later."
~ CA
P.S. What are you scared of?
Irrationally, mine are cockroaches and spontaneous adventures thrown at me last minute. Usually these are the best ones, so I'm unsure why they make me so anxious, I'm working on it though.