Defeating Fear, One Day At A Time

“Danger is very real. Fear is a choice.”

— Will Smith, as Cypher Raige, in After Earth (2013)

FEAR comes in many forms, mostly invisible, but sometimes visible, regularly unknown until we know it, but sometimes very well known and highly anticipated.

Fear threatens. It prowls. It roars conspicuously. But we, personally, are the only ones exposed. Nobody else sees it like we do, personally. It is, therefore, a construction, a fabrication, something we make from our own material – and from the materials life gives us via our situations and the way we see them. We are all creative artists, but we don’t recognise that when we incipiently construct these imaginings, we give birth to a thing that looks like it can destroy.

Fear can only destroy us if we let it destroy us. Fear needs our permission.

We must be active in collusion with the fear, to believe in it so much that to takes over; we take it from having been created in our minds and we will it into actual creation, as it broaches true life, especially in our relationships.

Some of this is down way below the radar, so awareness of fear and how far it takes us is the key. The only true method for subduing fear is to become aware, to dissipate it in its initial movement, and to replace fear with faith. And, for it to work consistently, it needs to become habit.

One day at a time:

ü  Ask, “What are the threats just now, today? Are they real or are they magnified by my imagination?” Or, “How much of this present fear is being sponsored by my imagination?” Then relax.

ü  Dangers are real as much as they are dangerous. But danger is rare. We have the opportunity to become aware of danger (in real terms) and to create, every single day, the capacity for high alert, until it’s known that the threat has dissipated.

ü  Train yourself around the faith-response in preference to the fear-response. This is about the cases when you have discerned that your fears are less about real danger and more about what could but probably won’t happen.

ü  Be gentle with yourself. Fears can be highly taxing. Your energy is better conserved for a better thing. What is that better thing, just now?

Danger is very real. Fear is a choice. Wisdom splits the difference. With discernment we have power to meet danger with courage, and to dispel fears with faith.

© 2013 S. J. Wickham.