“Fear is the cheapest room in the house.
I would like to see you living in better conditions.”
~Hafiz
If you look into the heart of fear, what do you find? Nothing.
Fear: it’s a word, a set of letters that we agree has a certain meaning. It’s a label for physical agitation in the body and a way of thinking that distorts things to look negative, pessimistic, and hopeless.
But what is it really? Nothing more than a belief, something we take to be true, an unquestioned emotion that separates us from life.
Here’s an important truth about fear: it is absolutely possible to live in this world without being driven by it. That’s how you become available to openness, potential, and inspiration.
Not that you need to get rid of fear. Fear can arise—it’s a normal experience in the human body—but when you see what it actually is, it loses its power over you.
Like sand sifting through your fingers, there’s nothing to hold onto…and, like a miracle, you discover you’re free…
The Power of Fear
Fear creates all kinds of trouble when we believe its stories. We’re afraid of being alone, of not having enough money, of being vulnerable with people, of failing (or succeeding), of stepping outside of our comfort zone, of death.
It’s at the root of procrastination, addiction, compulsive behavior, inadequacy, shame, and envy. Not to mention racism, hate, wars, and violence of all kinds.
Take a look at our world today, and you’ll see the division that fear creates. When we live in fear, our view of ourselves and the world constricts, and we overlook the actual reality of who we are.
You are not the fearful, limited being hiding from life that you think you are, although you may be a master at playing that role.
When fear falls away, you know yourself as luminous…already fulfilled…naturally loving…effortlessly overflowing… This is you in this very moment—behind the mask of fear!
How to know this truth? Question fear. Go right into the direct experience of it so you can know what it is and how it affects you. Then you’re poised to step away from its false stories and into the reality of your full aliveness.
We call fear an emotion, and all emotions are made up of two things: a story in our minds about what’s happening and physical sensations. Let’s explore the truth about fear.
Inquiry: The Stories of Fear
Notice that the content of fearful thoughts is negative and limiting. They are pure imagination, which means they make up stories: imagining that something bad will happen in the future—when you have no idea what will happen, imagining that you’re perceiving a person or situation correctly—when you don’t actually know.
And how does the fear mind guide us? It says, “No” to possibilities outside your comfort zone, pointing to all the things that could go wrong.
New Options: Fearful thoughts expect the worst. Realize that they’re not true and that you have the choice to not believe them. After all, why would you believe a thought that isn’t true?
Instead, say, “I don’t know what will happen.” Or, from a loving heart ask, “What is the reality of this situation?”
Believing the limiting stories of fear might have served at some point in your life, but are they still needed? If you turn attention away from the fog of the fear-fueled mind, you immediately expand into your present moment experience…now available to insight, compassion, and clear seeing.
Inquiry: The Body in Fear
Lose interest in the fear stories in the mind, and what are you aware of? Physical sensations.
Notice how much the experience of fear is physical. Bring your attention into the body, and open to sensations—vibration, flutter, tightening, contraction, nausea, anxious energy.
Get curious about the physical expression of fear. If you’ve been stuck in the stories for a long time, you may have never noticed it before!
New Options: Allow the experience of sensations to be present. Without adding any thoughts about them, notice they’re just energy coming and going through you, like clouds floating across the sky.
You’re simply here, present with sensations arising with no judgment, no preference, and no story. Where’s the problem now?
This is how we untangle fear. We see it for what it actually is: physical sensations and a limiting, mind-created story. Now that you’re aware of the reality of fear, does it need to overpower you and your life?
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Fear may have been your faithful companion, but know this: it is not who you are.
Focusing on fear agitates our systems and overlooks the intelligence of our present moment experience. Once we get out of our minds, we open into expanded possibilities infused with aliveness and love.
The feeling of separation from ourselves and the world falls away…and we find ourselves fully available to life as it is.