Fear of Fear
Miedo al miedo
A question about how the anticipation of fear serves as a guardian, and what happens when we step through it.
Fear of Fear
A question about how the anticipation of fear serves as a guardian, and what happens when we step through it.
I know, based on what I've communicated with you, that fear is definitely a guardian of some kind for me. And as you just said, anticipating the fear: I haven't really noticed before that that might be part of it.
There is an anticipation of fear once you've stepped through. It's an energy that can become uncomfortable, but you can get comfortable in it quite quickly once you're able to dive in.
The anticipation as resistance
Let me speak to this a little further. There is the anticipation of fear because it is a sensation full of energy and aliveness, and something in us cannot coexist with that kind of energy. There is a certain contraction, a certain smallness, that the fear pierces through. So in that "fear of fear," what we are actually trying to do is preserve a contraction.
What the contraction becomes
If we step into it, the energy of that fear starts to melt the contraction. What the fear of fear is really resisting is the letting go of that contraction. And that contraction becomes "I." It becomes what I am, what I appear to be, what I seem or feel to be, which I am not really. But to my current understanding, that is what I am, and it feels as though it is under threat. In truth, though, it is an energy that begins to melt that false sense of self and push through it.
Fear recognized as aliveness
Once that happens, the fear can be recognized as something else entirely. It can be recognized as aliveness, as passion, as excitement. It has different flavors. That is why we fear what we love or want the most.