Day 3: The Power of Fear

“If you catch yourself in the track of fear, just by having that awareness, you can shift your attention into the track of love.”

– Don Miguel Ruiz, The Mastery of Love p. 71           

Fear-based thinking is a dangerous way to live. We are on guard 24/7 and we can go into a fight or flight reaction based on a defense mechanism put in place in childhood that is the power of fear. We could have watched news, heard name-calling, witnessed fighting, and that is just naming a few light incidents. When we are faced with addictions, abandonment, abuse, prejudice, rape, and a fear based environment, who could blame us for having such an unstable foundation. The power of fear wins. No matter what we have been through in the past, we CAN change. Nobody can make us, or force us to let go of the fear-based defense mechanisms. We can’t change because someone we love wants us to be different. We can only release these fears when we are really ready to dig into them and be present to why we used them, how they served us, and how they are not working anymore.

A suggestion to those of you who are about to embark on this cleanup, be aware of any addictions you use to numb yourself. This is not the time to engage. I would go as far to suggest, staying away from video games, drugs, alcohol, indulgent eating, bing watching T.V., obsessively focusing on other people’s lives, and whatever else you tend to use to avoid looking at yourself, even if you use a relationship and doing for others, I hope you take the time to slow down and focus on you. You deserve your best life. If you are avoiding the process of getting healthier, you will keep repeating the same patterns that are keeping you down.

We feel trapped in patterns of living that aren’t making our lives better. We actually are even hurting the people we love by keeping this fear-based thinking alive. If we truly want to break this thought process we have to see how it is not serving us anymore and come up with ideas of thoughts, feelings, actions, and perceptions that will contribute to the life we actually WANT. If you can motivate yourself to try new things in order to occupy the time you would have been spending avoiding yourself, do it. Meditation, exercise, self-help audiobooks, cleaning, or writing are a few suggestions based on what I used to help me stay focused on my path. Don’t beat yourself up if you aren’t there.

I can’t tell you how many books I stopped reading because the author told me to write something down. If you are considering stopping because of having to do any physical work, don’t do it! That is your fear trying to keep you down. Just keep reading, only do the work you feel an internal calling to do. You may decide to read this 10 times before you make any changes, it really doesn’t matter, if you are making progress, honor yourself for that. Just reading this series may be a huge step for you. Don’t lose your joy in the process because you think you aren’t doing enough. You’re here, that is enough.

It may take doing some investigating of different ways of thinking to figure out how to change the language you have been using. This is not an overnight process. One of my hardest lessons in the process of giving up fear-based thinking was the amount of time it takes to do it. I’m still working on it! I have been working on it for years. We are raised with fear-based thinking from early on and we are engaged in a society that thrives on it. One of my practices is to watch how certain fear-based thinking in society triggers me and come up with a different way to look at the situation. This helps me to keep my brain and heart in the right place in order to create more love and peace in my life.

Check out 90-Day A Better Me Letters Series: Day 3 – The Power of Fear , the letter on fear represents a jumping off point. Pay close attention to what comes up. Write down or pay attention to any fears that surface, look into how believing the fears hold you back, and come up with some solutions, just thoughts about other ways to handle yourself. If you want the best results, write your own letters about the fears that come up in your life.

With Love and Gratitude,

Rachael Wolff ©2019