fear: to be afraid or feel anxious or apprehensive about a possible or probable situation or event (source)
fear is one of those interesting little ideas that can walk through the door, not knowing anyone, meet, greet and completely consume you in a matter of minutes; if you allow it to. fear can start as something teeny, tiny only to manifest itself into every aspect of your day to day life. its, actually, rather impressive.
how do fears come about? well, speaking from an evolutionary standpoint we can say that fears are simply there to aid in self preservation. the same way that children are afraid to walk in the basement at night, or perhaps the way that an adult may not wish to enter into a dark, creepy cemetary at night. what’s stopping either of these situations from occurring – fear. a fear of the dark, of ghot’s, or someone waiting in vain to scare the hell out of us. either way it’s fear.
yet, as we have evolved as have our fears. some fears are necessary, such as fear of snakes (depending on your geographical location) can be very helpful in keeping oneself alive. however, there are other fears much, much worse. simpler fears, fearing that failure is ones only option is a fear that can consume you and your life. fearing that attempting to suceed will only lead to failure, fearing that as the house burns down around you, your movements halt, you’re afraid of the fire. not exactly life saving fears if you ask me.
so where do they, these fears, come from? well, i think for the most part these types of fears stem from childhood, like so much else out there it all started when you were too young to know any better. perhaps there was an incident so terrible, horrific and mind numbing that once experienced your brain locked away those all emotions and memories and the side effect is fear, however irrational it may be. (also of note, painful memories are said to be stored in the muscle tissue. so, if you find out there are memories you should have and don’t, i recommend going for a massage and holding the memory in your head. don’t try to hard to remember, you will push it away. just hold the thought there and be sure you are prepared (emotionally) for whatever you may remember. many people have issues remembering simply because they think they are ready when in reality that couldn’t be farther from the truth.)
if the fear began in childhood how are we ever to face it and overcome our fear as adults? well, easily said, not such done. thankfully, as adults we have the ability to control our own actions. i suppose the first step is to admit to yourself the fear. usually the easiest part. then its time to try to remember why this fear even exists. if you cant think of anthing ask those around you. ask your parents, aunt’s, uncle’s, brother’s, sister’s, cousin’s – just start asking! (provided your not ashamed of your fear; o and never be shamed of fear by the way. ive said those without fear simply haven’t experienced enough) you may find out that when you were 9 years old you were attacked by a small group of dogs while walking down the street to your grandmothers house. you may find that your childhood is nothing like you would have imagined/remembered it to be.
in many cases simply knowing what the event was the brought on the fear is enough to displace the fear itself. other cases can be more difficult especially if there was some sort of serious violation of your liberties. in these types of cases i recommend constant and through introspection. ask yourself Why and don’t stop until you are satisfied with your answer. this is not usually a quick process.
once you have conquered your fear, then what? well then we begin to live, begin to love and being to grow. your future can never beging if you’re still harboring the past. live.
