Fear

Tough day yesterday. During the night, C.C. wasn't feeling well. By early morning we were both concerned. I drove him to Emergency where we spent several hours waiting as he underwent tests. They ruled out heart and lungs and determined the cause. It will need some attention -- but it's not as life threatening as we both feared.

Strange thing fear. It permeates my body, consumes my thinking, runs like a river of disquiet coursing through my veins, disturbing my peace of mind, disrupting my serenity.

I awoke around two this morning. Couldn't sleep. Moved to the couch. My mind was on fast forward. Into hyper-drive around 'what if' thinking. Leaping from one disaster to another, I quickly became consumed with the fear of what didn't happen, and am confident won't happen. But my mind was on a tear. It was having a grand time jolting me like a pinball through the pillars of its jarring insistence I acknowledge its presence and look at what I fear.

I do not fear C.C.'s health. I fear my feelings. I fear caring about him. I fear he will leave. He will disappear. He will not care back in return. I fear feeling exposed, open, vulnerable. I fear love.

Tough to face that one. The little voice whispers, isn't this what you want? Isn't this what it's all about?

Is it, I wonder, even though I know it is.

Fear is pernicious. It saturates my senses like a too heavy perfume drowning out all sensation of the world around me. Cloying. Destroying. Fear weighs me down.

I breathe.

Acknowledging my fear is key to letting it go. I can't change it, rearrange it, or even blow it up. I have to give it room to evaporate with each cleansing breath of reality

I let it flow through my veins. Breathe in. Breathe out. Imagine each inhalation drawing pure clean air into my cells. Imagine each breath drawing in the beauty and joy and love of the world around me. Imagine each inhalation transforming the fear into love. Imagine the chemical make-up of my fear being exchanged for love. I am the alchemist transforming my fear into what is real and true of my life in this moment.

Exhale. Imagine each exhalation filling up with pure, sweet, love. Imagine each breath flowing out of my body filled with fear transformed into energy -- positive, invigorating, live-giving.

Breathe.

I know fear. Always have. What I didn't know was how to move through my fear into peace of mind and calmness. I used to believe fear was what I was meant to hold onto.

Now, I know different. Today, I know the truth.

Fear just is. The opportunity to be courageous. The medium for change. Fear is an emotion. It is simply a conduit to my feelings. To what is real. To what is meaningful in my life today. I let it flow and as it flows I reclaim my sense of balance, my well-being.

I know fear. And I know, love is greater. Love is the sum of my courage, my fear, my knowledge, my awareness. It is all I need to move with grace, ease and dignity through fear into this moment where I am all that I am meant to be.

The question is: Where do you let fear keep you stuck in believing what might be, actually is? Where does fear keep you from letting go and claiming your right to be the magnificent human being you are meant to be?