Fears

The day started pretty much as a copy of the prior one. There was a slight difference due to the fact that I got up a little earlier to do some morning shopping at Target. Some days its fun to get an early start and try to find a great bargain, however on this day I left empty handed and a little disappointed. When I arrived at work I found a small crowd of people huddled in the lobby in front of the elevators. There are six of them. Yet, it seems like they only run a couple at a time some days. The longer I stood there the more people began to gather. Finally, word began to spread that there had been a water valve problem on the 12th floor and only one elevator was working because the rest were wet. I’m not a big fan of elevators, but just try to never think about them. Finally, the door opened and a bunch of us packed in like sardines. The people that were coming off the elevator said to be careful because the floor was wet. Once the door closed and we began to move we realized that water was dripping from the ceiling. It was an eerie feeling as the water dripped and dripped. I was happy to finally reach my floor, grab a cup of coffee and settle in at my desk. A couple of hours later my sister called and said they were evacuating her building. Apparently, a business that is located right behind her employer was planning some sort of strike and there were rumors of some bad things happening. All of these things got me to thinking about fear. I began to list in my journal all kinds of fears people have, anything from being afraid of certain animals to public speaking. Some say that fear is just false evidence appearing real, yet sometimes the evidence isn’t false. Sometimes there’s a real threat and it’s staring us right in the face. Then what? Some things are just out of our control. If we really were to consider all the things that we could fear we probably would not go out of the house. I read a quote one time from a little girl that said I’m not afraid of the dark, but afraid of what’s in the dark. I’ve also read that we are born with only two real fears. Apparently by nature we are afraid of loud noises and falling. All other fears are learned.

Sometimes fear moves us forward and makes us act. Other times fear completely freezes us. We get stuck and shut down. If we really believed that we are only really afraid of loud noises and falling and somehow unlearned all our other fears I wonder how many things we would do in life. There is a school of thought that says we should just feel the fear and do it anyway. Is that the best solution? The flip side is what are we missing out on by letting fear hold us back? What if all that we ever really wanted was just on the other side of our fears? Is it really just as simple as confronting our fears? I don’t know if it’s the fact that we fear something in particular or fear the aftermath of things. Maybe the fear is in can I live with the consequences of this if it happens or will I ever be able to recover? We are naturally equipped with a fight or flight response. By instinct we are designed to protect ourselves. If we really relied on that fact does that make us any less afraid?

What if we were to really take on our fears? Psychologists suggest making a list of fears and then release by getting to the root of what is going on. Most of the things we fear never happen anyway, so why waste good energy. I’ll end with giving you a quick list of the things that came to me of what people fear, but what about you, what are you afraid of and do those fears move you forward or do they hold you back?

A short list of fears…People can fear dying, sickness, being alone, love, animals, financial ruin, public speaking, physical harm, natural disasters, falling, success, failure, elevators, heights, flying, loss, making a mistake, ridicule, rejection and the unknown.
Makes you wonder how we ever make it out of the house some days