Tackling Your Fear

“Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood. Now is the time to understand more, so that we may fear less.” – Marie Curie

For many of us, fear tends to exert some amount of control in our lives. When faced with it, we tend to do one of two things: either we reject it, and push on carelessly; or we embrace it–we become a bit apprehensive, overly cautious, judgmental, or defensive–and therefore avoid the things that caused it. But what Marie is telling us is that we have another choice–understanding our fears.

I have recently noticed that those times in which I find myself in a situation that invokes a sense of fear from within, taking the time to understand those feelings is the only way to both calm the fear, and to develop a way to help prevent future recurrences of it. But doing so requires that I first recognize it for what it is, and accept it as a part of who I am. After I am able to do this, I can try to listen to it and learn what it is trying to tell me, what it has to teach me about the situation and myself.

Letting our fears control us is bad. Conversely, always pushing to “conquer” our fears can be similarly bad for us. The key is learning to listen to our fears–to become aware of just what they have to say to us.

Pay close attention to any fears you have daily–let them teach you.

Questions to consider:

Have you ever considered the possibility that our fears may be a part of us in order to teach us some very important lessons about ourselves?

What are you afraid of? Have you ever listened to that fear?

What advice do you tend to give to people who are afraid to do something? Do you follow your own advice?

For further thought:

“It is not that you must be free from fear. The moment you try to free yourself from fear, you create a resistance against fear. Resistance, in any form, does not end fear. What is needed, rather than running away or controlling or suppressing or any other resistance, is understanding fear; that means, watch it, learn about it, come directly into contact with it. We are to learn about fear, not how to escape from it, not how to resist it through courage and so on.” – Jiddu Krishnamurti