Fear is the part of ourselves we need for basic survival, it protects us from danger. Yes, we are afraid of losing our life, health, relationships, and money, of course. It keeps us on our toes. Yet, it can drive us to lose those exact basics we love so much when it operates without our awareness. It can poison that which we love, within ourselves and with others. We can feel crazy with fear over a simple life task or personal interaction with another, even though our life does not depend on it.
Fear may appear at various times real or imagined. It’s still fear. It can appear in a life threatening situation or the fear of embarrassment and rejection. It could appear as a physical symptom, such as, a stomach ache, headache or worse if left unattended. Fear is a mind boggling relationship that seems impossible at times and effortless at other times.
The imagined fear is no longer about survival in reality, but survival in an imagined reality based on events from the past. Imagined consequences are activated in the mind by various people, money situations, a particular behavior of a child, sex, emotional intimacy, loss, confusion etc. Even if we are aware of this simple fact, we can still feel dominated by fear from time to time. The tenacity of fear can seem unshakable.
Sometimes we experience fear blocking life; such as, blocking fulfilment, blocking genuine closeness with another or blocking meaning itself. It can block an expression of love for fear of rejection or “what will they think”. As we study our fear and that of others, we gradually get some understanding of its purpose, tenacity, and the potential poisoning of an individual and culture.
I see from my experiences and work with others in psychotherapy and meditation that fear has a crazy purpose: To protect the soul at all cost even if it means panic, depression, an ulcer, cancer and death. In the beginning of therapy most fear is a secret to the client and the therapist. Then the secret fears gradually come out; such as, “I am afraid to be alone”, “I am afraid of being hurt again”, “I am afraid of my emotions”. After that, the student can understand that a fear developed in the past is now being attached to situations in the present, “I am afraid he or she will hurt me because I was hurt in the past”. The secret fear is out, to be felt and explored.
The secret love of fear
“So, I know that I am afraid of getting hurt again, why doesn’t that help me get rid of the fear? I am still afraid of being hurt”. Of course that would be activated. But now the problem is the love of fear. It is familiar and dependable. It is so sticky. Commonly, I hear people say at an in-depth stage of therapy, “I don’t know who I would be without my fear”. I hear devoted love in that statement. “I don’t know how I could live without you!”.
The fear gives a structure, it provides primitive rules and guidelines for relationship. Most of the time these primitive rules are unknown, unconscious. For example, “Don’t express yourself, that is what got you in trouble, in the first place.” “If I don’t express what I need, I won’t get disappointed”, simple as that, but poison to the soul. The soul wants to live, we can see it in children if we have forgotten it in ourselves. How to retrieve this soul by sacrificing the fear is the next step. TO BE CONTINUED NEXT WEEK
