Banish the fear
What are your hopes?
What are your dreams?
Who are you?
What do you want from life?
What are you afraid of?
These are big questions we all ask of our friends, our families, and ourselves.
I have been feeling rather introspective the past few days. Part of this is related to what I am reading – Paulo Coelho’s The Valkyries. This is causing me to question a great deal about the above questions. The question, though, causing me the most issues is the last:
What are you afraid of?
This is a rather poignant question I am trying to face. I do not fear anything traditional anymore – like spiders, heights, closed spaces and whatnot; what I fear are huge abstracts – failure and success.
While I could get into my own view of these issues – I actually am writing this about a far larger issue. Because I see something that is terribly, terribly wrong in our society, and it is an enormous, faceless abstract that is not being properly addressed.
What are YOU afraid of?
Fear is being used EVERY SINGLE DAY by our business leaders, our politicians, the press, and various other sources of information and authority to keep us in line. I’ve talked about this before – but not like this. We are fearful of these immense, abstract things: terrorism, economic crashes, Republicans, Democrats, communists, socialists, natural disasters, guns, nukes, poverty, wealth…I could go on and on. Everywhere we turn its fear Fear FEAR! And we are swallowing that message like the sweetest candy ever invented.
What are WE afraid of?
Living in fear is a dangerous thing. Fear interferes with forward action. Fear prevents us from taking risks – good and bad. Fear does not lead us to success – it leads us to failure.
Fear is not the same as caution. Caution is an examination of a subject, and judging what action to take based on that. Fear is not rational – fear is purely emotional, probably the most visceral emotion we are capable of.
And we are being played by so very many entities, based on our fears. They are using fear to control us, dominate us, direct us, distract us. Fear is the ultimate weapon, the ultimate means to an end. Fear keeps our press entities profitable, keeps the politicians in office, keeps people in poverty and sorrow.
We are letting fear destroy us. We are letting fear change how we live, who we are, and where we are going in this life. Fear is dictating our actions, our motions, our plans. And fear is dividing us, destroying us, and tearing us apart on almost every imaginable level.
It’s not enough to speak the Litany against Fear, or something similar. We have to face our fear. We have to look at what fear makes us, and we need to recognize that unless we overcome our fear – it will continue to obliterate us. We need to acknowledge that fear is a feeling – and we can change it.
You control how you feel. Period. You are in control of this. Yes, things will make you angry, happy, sad, frustrated, excited, fearful, horny, anxious, apathetic – but YOU choose how long you will FEEL this. YOU choose how you will let that feeling hold onto you. YOU choose how that feeling will affect you, your actions, etc. It is on YOU to control your feelings.
Which brings me to my point. What are we afraid of? And the reason I ask this question is because unless we answer it, and answer it soon – there isn’t going to be much left of our lives EXCEPT for fear.
Take a look around at the media, the messages delivered by our politicians, and everything else trying to play on our fears. Really try to notice just how dominant fear is in every aspect of our lives. And when you see it – THINK ABOUT IT. Rationalize it. And try to break away from the emotional reaction it causes.
If we can stop the fear, if we can ignore the deluge of messages commanding us to be fearful of all these abstract things – we can make this world a better place. We can solve our economic woes, we can fight the greed and corruption, we can work TOGETHER to improve our collective lot in life. But until we acknowledge, and then displace the fear – we’re only spinning our wheels.
Fear mongering is not an acceptable way to control people. We are not incapable creatures who can be victimized by those in power – and we need to show them that! We need to use our free will to recognize, confront, and ultimately BANISH fear. And when we stop living in fear – I think we will all see a better way, a better life, a better existence.
Please consider my words. Consider what it is you are fearful of – and think about how your life will be WITHOUT that fear! Don’t just ask the question – give it some thought, and replace the fear with courage.
What are you afraid of?
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