There were four of us sitting around a circular kitchen table discussing the topic of interest at the moment. Without my usual filter, I blurted out “I’m going to stop letting fear control my life.” The conversation stopped midstream and three sets of eyes turned in my direction. No one said anything to my statement of intent. Three seconds later the conversation took up where it had left off.
I was not surprised with their response or lack there of. What could they say? “How will you overcome fear?” I had broached a topic most are uncomfortable with. We all have fear, everyone knows this to be true. What was uncomfortable was I had taken it a step further and admitted fear controlled my life. Who wants to admit that truth? Me, I guess.
Now that I had proclaimed my intention out loud, how in the world would I accomplish it? The next day I began to journal. Without really knowing where to begin I wrote down the statement I had made the prior night, “I’m going to stop letting fear control me”. Why had I chose the word letting? Looking up its definition: allow, give permission to, empower, authorize. I allow, give permission to, empower fear to control me! How do I do that? And why? What surprised me about this admission was that I found not only disbelief and confusion, there was also a very real sense of hope. Why would I feel hope, I asked myself. The answer: if I truly allowed fear to control me then I must also have the power not to. I was just at a loss on how I gave fear permission to control me, much less how to stop doing it to begin with.
BUT I WOULD NOT STOP UNTIL I FOUND THE ANSWER, that I was sure of.
“A Conversation With Fear” are the answers to the many questions I asked.
Questions Asked – Questions Answered
