Recovering from Fear Addiction

Fear is an addiction of the mind. Recovering from Fear Addiction can change the very way you live your life and experience the world. It is a mind that is locked in the learned memories of the past or one that escapes into the imagined images it sees in the future. On either spectrum the thoughts are not real. Fear in fact is false evidence appearing real. Today we need to learn how to consciously overcome fear, stress and anxiety in the external world that can be ramped up by a survival mind in our internal worlds.

Waking up from past experiences and letting go fo our need to control future experiences that are out of our hands is the first step to Self Mastery. If you are unable to master yourself, you will not be able to master the things outside of you. You will not be able to actualise all your potential because opportunities and potential are only active in a present moment mindset. What that means is that you must be mindful and aware of where you are. You must train the mind to see the difference between the real and the imaged. You have the same material within you that is also in the cosmos. Starts and you are made up of the same thing. But don’t look to the stars for help and signs and a way through your problems in life. Don’t only look to external medications to solve your internal problems. Rather learn how to let go of the minds addiction to fear and learn how to rest in the promise of right now. You may not be ecstatic right now. But you are okay. Remind your mind of that and build your potential to crate what you really, really want from the reality of who you are and what you are becoming right now.

Is life an accident ?

If you are living in the dark it would make sense to be afraid. If you are not entirely aware of what you are doing, that can be a scary experience. After a while of living blind like that, you may start to think that everything is just random and accidental. You could be attacked at any moment. If you see the world as a dangerous place, that danger lies in wait around every corner. If you live like this, stress will become your best friend. Misery loves company they say. Indeed, those people who live lives of misery feel there is no purpose or reason to life. They live life believing if they find happiness or misery that it is just going to happen by chance. By accident. So there is nothing to strive for. No intention to keep mindful of at all. If you believe life is an accident, you will be waiting for accidents to happen all around you. As you think, so shall you be. It is natural for us as human being who live like this to be addicted to fear. Fear addiction becomes a way of life for many of us over time. We stop seeing how life is unfolding before us and for us. We become blind to the fact that life has a purpose, and that you yourself have a purpose. There is safety in purpose because it means that you are not here by accident and you will not come to your end by accident. All that Recovering from Fear Addiction means is that you are able to step out of the fear of thinking you will be squashed like an ant around every corner. Our minds are programmed to avoid being squashed and that is the very reason that fear may rule your life.

Darkness is not real

Next time you watch a horror movie or thriller, see what life is like for the people being chased and stalked. There is an intensity every time they open a curtain or turn a corner. This is what life becomes like for people who fall asleep and think that life is a nightmare. What we need to do to overcome, or start recovering from Fear Addiction is simply to mindfully start waking up. Yes. When a child is having a nightmare, you as an adult will go and wake them up and comfort them. Joel Osteen is right when he says that says that “You’re going to go through tough times – that’s life. But I say, ‘Nothing happens to you, it happens for you.’ See the positive in negative events.” There are no accidents as you start to wake up consciously. When you wake up, like magic, the darkness simply disappears! Darkness and nightmares are not real. They both pass like paper ships when you bring love, hope, faith, curiosity and your intentions to the party of life.

If you are walking around in the dark you should be afraid. If you allow the subconscious to lead you around each corner of life as you navigate your purpose, then you should be afraid. You will bang into a ton of walls if you cannot see where you are going. This seeing I am speaking of here is available to you. To everyone. In fact life has two parts to it. Just like everything else has a day and night, a good and bad or a right and a wrong. So you have sight and blindness. You have the seen and the unseen to deal with in life. When you start to understand that there are dark nights of the soul, but also ways through those dark nights, you have started to wake up. You need to see both. Then you will no longer be afraid of the dark, or what you cannot see.

“Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls; the most massive characters are seared with scars.” – Khalil Gibran

When I teach recovery for suicide prevention, depression and burnout I say that the way to start recovering from Fear Addiction begins with an awareness that is is happening to you. Next time a door slams in the wind and you jump, remind yourself mindfully that you are okay. When you loose a job or a relationship and you start to spiral into negativity you can do the same thing. Remind yourself that you’re okay and that there is light, purpose and intention around the next corner rather than dread, doom and gloom. When things change you can either embrace the change or retract from it.

Making the choice to step out of the darkness and into the light take courage. Making the choice to see that every day you live has divine purpose and meaning to it, even if you cannot see it, takes deep inner grit, self control and even social intelligence. It takes zest, optimism and gratitude to start to see that life has deep meaning for you, for everything you do and for everyone you meet. There are no accidents. There is only a choice of what meaning you will assign to what happens to you and what you do with what happens to you. When you have a flat tire, lose a job, fail a test or end a relationship you can either let fear, anxiety and stress creep in or you can embrace the darkness of the uncertainty you see with a little light. You see, that light is consciousness for us at the end of the day. The more conscious you are the less fear there is. The more unconscious you are the more afraid you will be of the darkness.

“All the adversity I’ve had in my life, all my troubles and obstacles, have strengthened me…. You may not realise it when it happens, but a kick in the teeth may be the best thing in the world for you.”

WALT DISNEY

A PRAYER FOR OVERCOMING FEAR

As we start to focus on suicide prevention month I am reminded that healing is for the humble. It is not the body that must die, it is the fear that must die. We cannot mistake the body for the mind, which happens over time. What the mind believes the body starts to experience. But it is only thoughts and not real. It is the false appearing real! So we need to cast out that fear as we stop the thoughts. Not the body. If you cannot get humble enough to pray, you may need to relook at your ego-defences. Fear has a way of making us close off like no other emotion we can experience.

Dear God, I come before You to lay my panic and anxiety at Your feet.

When I’m crushed by my fears and worries,

remind me of Your power and Your grace.

Fill me with Your peace as I trust in You and You alone.

There is no fear in love.

But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment.

The one who fears is not made perfect in love.

I choose today to love and not fear.

To be grateful and not judgemental and to be fearless not fearful.

Mindful and not mindless.

Hopeful and not hopeless. So be it!

One of my favourite authors is Richard Rhor who says this about fear. “Love is the totally enlightened, entirely nonsensical way out of this pattern. Love has to be worked toward, received, and enjoyed, first of all by recognising our deep capacity for fear and hate. But remember, we gather around the negative space quickly, while we “fall into” love rather slowly, and only with lots of practice at falling.” So may you fall into love rather than fear over the next 90 days or so as you practice healing, fearlessness and faith in yourself, others, and Life. Be the change you want to see in your world as you start Recovering from Fear Addiction yourself and then start teaching others to do the same. Namaskaram!

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