Fear is the driving force of the world.
I would prefer saying love is the driving force of the world, but the amount of psycho-spiritual contortions I’d have to do is a bit too much.
On the other hand, if love is your preferred word for all-that-is then that’s okay, I guess.
But if we look at most human activity, unconditional love, as it’s often called, is not what we see.
What we see is fear. We can all see it.
When we dig beyond the surface (a little is enough), we see fear pulling the strings.
Look at any emotion. Look at everything you want and do in life. Look at what humans do.
Now tilt your head 45 degrees and look behind it.
What do you see?
Fear.
Even what we commonly call love is puppeteered by fear.
Think about any romantic relationship you had and see how much of it was a cocktail of clinging, worrying, pushing, demanding, etc.
Fear is the bottleneck of the human experience.
I’m not saying that because I’m a lover of fear. On the contrary, I’m talking about fear because I’m a lover of life.
When we get beyond fear-based living, life truly becomes a different experience. But for that, we have to do one thing first — plunge into the fear.
The thing with fear is that it’s different than the other negative emotions — it’s their source.
You might have “worked” with fear for many years and still feel like fear has a subtle, yet tight, grip over your life.
The reason for that is that you can’t get rid of fear. You can only surrender to fear.
This is what dealing with fear really means.
No longer fighting it. No longer justifying it. No longer sugarcoating it. No longer keeping it at bay with techniques.
Granted, this might be easier said than done because ego doesn’t want to give up the reigns. Ego might even turn surrendering into an achievement for itself.
Tricky business.
But here is the catch.
Fear is like a pitch-black body of water. It’s intimidating and seems infinitely deep. But when you jump into it, you suddenly see that the water reaches only up to your ankles.
When you realize that, transformation is immanent.
Fear might still be there but instead of looking like an infinitely deep abyss, you see it as the murky puddle it is.
I like the story Osho tells in his book Courage:
“A man walking in the night slipped and fell from a rocky path. Afraid he would fall down thousands of feet, because he knew that just at the edge of the path was a very deep valley, he grabbed hold of a branch that was overhanging the edge. In the darkness of night all he could see below him was a bottomless abyss. He shouted and his own shout was reflected back — there was nobody to hear him.
You can imagine that man, and his whole night of torture. Every moment there was death below, his hands were becoming cold, he was losing his grip … but he managed to hold on, and as the sun came out he looked down … and he laughed! There was no abyss. Just six inches below his feet there was a rock ledge. He could have rested the whole night, slept well — the ledge was big enough — but instead, the whole night was a nightmare.”
From my own experience I can say to you:
The fear is not more than six inches deep. Now it is up to you whether you want to go on clinging to the branch and turn your life into a nightmare, or whether you would love to leave the branch and stand on your feet.”
Talking about fear in this way can sometimes seem a bit poetic or abstract.
But this is just for fun and giggles.
You experience fear. You know what it’s like. You can write the poetry and abstractions yourself.
I’m not some wise teacher who knows more than you and feels the need to teach you anything. I just like to write about this stuff and to understand it better (something I recommend doing).
So what I’m sharing here is not a how-to deal-with-fear guide. If anything it’s an invitation to look in your own experience.
See how fear is operating in your life. See what parts of your life are fear-infested. See the beliefs and opinions that are fueled by fear.
The emphasis is on seeing.
Seeing fear (or anything else for that matter) for what it really is already reduces its power over you significantly.
Real inner transformations do happen. I’ve seen it in my life and in the lives of people I know.
And one of the doorways is fear.
But no matter what kind of practices or paths you’re into you will encounter fear.
Encounter it then.
But don’t be afraid.
Fear is not the end.
Luka
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