Franklin Rooseelt once said,
"The only thing we have to fear is fear itself - nameless, unreasoning, unjustified, terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance."
In psychology, we have a case called “Battered Spouse Syndrome” where an abused spouse would remain in a destructive relationship because he/ she feels more comfortable with what he/she knows or afraid of which is what we call a DETRIMENTAL CERTAINTY than taking a chance of something unknown but may be good for him/ her which is what we call a BENEFICIAL UNCERTAINTY.
All of us have a certain degree of this psychological disorder in one way or another. Because majority of us, people, are more concerned of what we’re afraid of losing than what we have to gain.Yes, we have heard of fears of spiders, death, public speaking or being rejected. These are fears don’t just come out of nowhere but these fears have a deeper reason. When you really think about it, the main reason why we have fears, be it small such as the fear of insects or serious such as the fear of rejection and failure, the main reason why we have these fears is because
we are afraid of LOSING SOMETHING IMPORTANT to us.
People wants to go to heaven but don’t want to die because life is too important to give up. People are afraid of being rejected because they might lose the respect of people towards them. People are afraid of failure because they might have to give up their current success in life. I can go on and on with this but the main point in here is the fact that the main reason we have fears is because we have something important to lose. All of us have something important to lose which bring me to my next point:
ALL OF US have fears.
Since everyone of us has something to lose, all of us have fears. And since everyone is afraid of something then, it’s normal to have fears. Courage is not the absence of fear but the setting aside of fear. Dear reader, in some point of your life, there are instances where you stand in front of your fears staring at you, eye to eye. Yet, instead of trying to run away or complain about it, what you did was you faced it despite the fact that you were so scared to death and even wished you were dead and did what you needed to. After facing your fears, you look back, and said with a smile of confidence in your face,” It wasn’t that bad at all. Let’s do that again!” All of us have fears. Soldiers are afraid of dying but they go to the front lines, set their fear of dying aside and put the mission first. Professional salesmen are afraid of being rejected but they set aside that fear and sell anyway so that they can provide the basic needs of the people who depend on them and the goods and services of their clients. Being part of Toastmasters, I’m afraid of public speaking but I speak anyway even if I’m so scared to death because I want to develop confidence and trust towards myself, earn the love of my peers who face the same fear of public speaking as I am and, more importantly, to grow to my fullest potentials and inspire the people around me to do the same. All of us have fears but we face our fears anyway because that’s what life is all about.
In the book The 48 Laws of Power, “The Black Prince” Machiavelli once said,
“If you’re to choose between to be loved or feared, it’s far better to be feared than to beloved.”
Today, we can see this statement everywhere as the media show us so many themes on violence, revenge and fear. And to make this worse, a lot of people say that these things are normal when in fact it’s not. It’s, then, not such a wonder why a lot of people may look happy in the outside but, in reality, are afraid, are scared, are hopeless, are fearful. “Life is to be lived with more fear than love.”
Despite his popularity, I disagree with Machiavelli (and screw his pathetic ideologies!) for I believe that “Life is not to be lived with fear but to be lived with more LOVE than FEAR.” Yes, we all have fears. Yes, we all are afraid of losing something important to us. But we all understand that there’s something more to life than being consumed by our fears. We face our fears even if we’re so scared to death because of love. We may possibly lose something in the process but the gains of facing what you fear are far greater. Life ought to be motivated with more love than fear. The moment you do that, my friend, you begin to live life.
To end, I would like to leave you with this popular quote by Marianne Williamson:
"Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light not our darkness that frightens us. We ask ourselves 'who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous?' Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small doesn't serve the world. There's nothing enlightening about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it’s in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fears, our presence automatically liberates others. "
Dear readers, let us together face our fears and live a life motivated with more love than fear!
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