The importance of security is often accepted without question. Striving to achieve a comfortable and stable life, people play it safe. They put their passions on hold and instead, seek freedom from worries and hardships. They never learn how to overcome fear, and spend their life worrying too much.
Don’t take risks. Be reasonable. Get a safe job and stick with it. Don’t question the established order. Don’t waste time. Lock your door. Don’t talk to strangers. Stay in control. Always have a plan B. Don’t pick up hitchhikers. Keep an eye out for danger.
All these statements are rooted in fear. Fear of change. Fear of danger. Fear of the unknown. Fear of failure. Fear of losing control. Fear of being scared.
Modern society is organized around these fears. Insurance, soft mattresses, retirement plans, heated blankets, 9-to-5 jobs, weather forecast, sewage systems, pre-packaged meals, air conditioning, alarm clocks, artificial light – all these manipulate our surroundings so we can avoid the instability of reality. They shield us from our raw, unpredictable and chaotic environment. In a way, they’re all intoxicants – ways to escape sober and unaltered existence.
Even when things go “our way”, a secure life leaves us unfulfilled. Our external environment may be under control, but we’re left feeling empty inside. By overemphasizing the value of stability, we are cut from the richness of life.
When you live fearfully, you constantly compromise. You stay in dry but comfortable relationships. You keep working at a boring but stable job. You live in the grey zone where your lifestyle is too good to leave, but too bad to keep. You postpone your true passions and settle for 7 out of 10.
You may rationalize that you’ll pursue your dreams in the future, but it’s a mirage. It’s a trap.
Each action you take sculpts you. Your decisions constantly push you towards a direction. Status quo does not exist. It all comes down to how you evolve. On who you become.
When we let life be directed by how we feel, we do the bare minimum. We focus on getting by. Instead of evolving, we minimize unpleasantness. Jumping through hoops of instant gratification, our sense of purpose and direction wavers. We lose touch with the passionate fire inside us.
Every second you spend outside of what you’re truly passionate about, a part of you is repressed. You send yourself a strong signal; I don’t follow my heart. Eventually, apathy arises. You can’t even feel your heart; you’ve closed yourself down.
Animals have no choice but to live reactively. They’re limited to fight or flight. Their actions are predicted by their environment, by how they feel. But you are different. You can act despite fear. This is courage. You can use free will in the gap between stimulus and response, and live according to who you want to become. You can be a product of choice, not destiny.
You don’t have to react fearfully to chaos. You can approach instability and unpredictability with confidence. With a baseline of trust and courage, chaos can become your friend.
You are born with an inner longing for peace, freedom and happiness. Something inside you craves for more than mediocrity. A search for completion. A quest for meaning. This will never stop if you don’t learn how to overcome fear.
The way out of fear is not through control, but through trust. The pursuit of security is a vicious circle. It has no end: chasing security only produces more fear. Just watch the news, it’s filled with fear-based reactions that never solve anything.
You don’t need to jump off of cliffs or travel to dangerous places. It may help, but there’s no inherent reward in risking your life. However, there is enormous reward in meeting your fears face to face. The part of you that sees fear is not scared. Let this be your refuge.
Passion will naturally arise when you stop chasing it. That chase is also rooted in fear. Let it go and jump into the richness of life. Try living out of complete trust for a single afternoon. If you look for reasons to be fearful, you’ll always find plenty. That’s the paradigm most humans live in. It’s low risk and low reward. They focus on getting by, and die never having really lived. Switch to a paradigm of passion and confidence. Follow your intuition and live from your heart. See reasons to open yourself up and to love. Be proactive and ruthlessly passionate, no matter what. This is how to overcome fear.
Written By Rhea Baweja
Week 45, November ’20
