Tag: Fear

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In_Plain_Sight

Photo: Kranich17/Pixabay

As we go through our lives, we visually take in a great many things that register in our brains in various ways. Sometimes, we look all over the house for our car keys or glasses, only to find them in a very obvious place. Obvious to everyone but us. Driving a car through the city or the countryside brings more things to catch our attention, but we tend to describe our journey as bucolic or fast-paced, without mentioning the things we saw. When questioned by others, ‘Did you see the museum on Park Avenue?’ or perhaps, ‘Isn’t the old covered bridge beautiful?’ we offer an answer but only a half-baked one, not having remembered whether or not we saw it. Then we go on for some time about the things we made the trip to see. The things we expected to see. The reason we made the effort to see them. We saw what we wanted to see. And only what we wanted to see.

Which begs the question: how much do we miss in our lives by not observing those things we did not expect to see? Seeing the beauty of a stark landscape, or hearing  the laugh of a happy child, noticing the beauty of the stars in a clear night sky. How many people have we overlooked because we did not expect to see them come into our lives, and exiting just as quickly. And what about those people or situations that are not happy ones: those who suffer from disease, poverty or loneliness, or perhaps the stray dog near our work whose days are filled with finding food and shelter. While we cannot save the world ourselves, seeing it as it is, as it really is, and not as we expect it, can be the beginning of making it better.

We all read about those who took a chance on finding a better way to move through life; seeing people for who they are, what they need, and asking how we could help. It doesn’t take millions of dollars, or a foundation donating money or goods to make things better. Time is something we can all donate to any number of organizations that try to help adverse situations, allowing us to learn more about what is needed and how we, and those we know, make an effort to improve life for us all. These things are in plain sight of us all, but do we see them? If we do, does our discomfort lead us to ignore the problem, telling ourselves that surely someone is doing something to make this better. But is this the case? Largely, it is not the case, and things are being left to those ‘others’ who never appear, leaving us in the same situation.

Taking a chance by saying to ourselves ‘I am someone…’ who can make things begin to happen and to help nullify adverse situations and help those affected by them. Sticking our neck out is not something that is particularly comfortable at first, but like many things, it becomes easier the more we do it. Seeing the changes we help cause becomes its own reward for us, and the impact on others, unable to help themselves, makes our world a better place for all.

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Letting Go of the Anger

‘You will not be punished for your anger; you will be punished by your anger.’

                    —Buddha

Recently I have begun to let go of anger. Not to get angry. Not that the temptation is not there, of course, but I made a conscious decision to be aware of what I was doing, and to let it go. The quote that started this piece is absolutely spot-on: when we are angry, we are in a state of fear, and the thoughts that run through our mind are uncomfortable and worrying. Anger is the offspring of Fear, just as Kindness is the offspring of Love; two sides of the same coin. Anger, though, escalates quickly, like a fire in a dry wood, and soon we have quickly lost control of ourselves. On the road, the woman who pulled in front of my car, way too close for comfort, and I wanted to land on the horn, curse her out, and follow her for a while—to appear to be a threat?—but after a deep breath, and the realization that we were both okay, and really, that she had moved on emotionally, I was able to let it drop within me. My breathing returned to normal, my focus on driving returned, and I continued my journey home in relative peace. This episode in my life sounds harmless, and it was. In my past, however, I might not have taken this tack, and in trying to let her know she had really scared me with her manœuvre, I would have continued to talk it out, having a ‘conversation’—with myself—about what had just happened. The physical aspect of this sort of thing is really the amazing part, and proof positive that what we are thinking and saying has a big effect on our physical bodies, and therefore, on our health.

This little story is just one example of the type of thing that we hang onto far after the event itself has ended, and the result is that we feel the exact same fear, loathing, anger, and passion that we did in the moment; a moment that has passed into history. As the old saying goes, no matter how often you look at the past, there is nothing new there. Life is lived in the moment, this moment, right here and now. Not ten minutes ago, and not ten years ago. The point is to know our past, not to forget it, but to use the bad things, or failures, as lessons that teach us. Anger/Fear is a powerful thing, used by oligarchs and dictators to subdue people into following their wishes and not question them. On a more personal level, the fear of being fired or laid off from a job is real, and it may motivate us to do good work by really concentrating on the tasks in front of us. Fear is not a bad thing in itself, but a warning sign that things might be better is we take a different path or action. We are able to see this only if we are completely aware of our words, our actions, and the intent behind them. It is then that we are able to be at our most effective as human beings, and create a better world for us all by gently moving through life, awake and aware.

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The Anger That Drives Us

Anger. Even the word itself promises what it mean, with its hard consonants and short syllables. Right now, there is a lot of anger in the world. People are angry at other people, nations are angry with one another, neighbors don’t speak, and any sort of discourse that might be a way through anger is not happening. So people are walking around harboring anger that can manifest in an instant. In a fairly quiet situation, all of a sudden voices are raised, threats are made, and the separate peace with all try to keep is broken.

I am guilty of this, as are you. When I even think of something that upsets, or angers me, I can feel my breath shorten and my heart begin to beat faster. This can happen when I’m out in public, or when I’m alone…just by thinking of something I fear. Because that is the root of all anger: fear. When we are afraid, our primitive brain goes into survival mode and we react in ways we have been conditioned to know will protect us from annihilation. While ‘annihilation’ might seem like a strong word these days in most places in the world, understand that our primitive brain sees ALL threats with this ending possibility, and reacts accordingly to protect us from the threat, however primitive—barking dog running toward us—or sophisticated—fear of losing your job and not being able to support your family—and it goes quickly into preservation mode to negate the threat in front of us. Fear is an interesting thing to experience, and most people vividly remember something that really scared them, long after the experience passed.

How can we deal with this anger/fear better? There have been tomes written on this very subject, and offering another ‘solution’ hardly seems to have value. Facing your fears in ways like journaling or support groups works for some, but however we choose to face these obstacles, we need to do it when not directly facing said fear. Sort of like practicing your favorite sport before walking onto the playing field. The practice, and of being able to slow down your thoughts and actions enable you to begin reacting more consistently and calmly when your competitors endeavor to win the game. Free-writing, and emptying my mind on a particular subject is one of the ways I’ve found useful in learning what triggers old behavior patterns, knee-jerk reactions, and allows me to approach them to learn why they frighten me, without having to do something immediately. I’ve been able to see little things, as you do when you slow down your golf swing, for example, to find your movement has not been as consistent as you thought. With psychological fears, though, the ‘little movements’ can be very tiny things—a careless word, a glare—that helped form your remembrance of particular events that contributed to your fear of meeting new people, or public speaking, for example. Annihilation is truly a strong word for this sort of thing, but the physical reaction, the shortened breath, the beating heart, all communicate that this is truly how you are feeling. As such, these fears are to be taken seriously and not dismissed as silly, or inconsequential, as we have been told sometimes.

And self-knowledge may not be the key to paradise, it can help us come nearer to it.

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Carefully Taught

‘You’ve got to be carefully taught…’ goes the refrain from a song in the Broadway musical South Pacific. The man singing is the young lieutenant from the USA, who has fallen in love with a young Polynesian woman, and is beginning to hear from others that he’s making a mistake, that it’s not ‘right’ or ‘natural’ and so forth: that a Caucasian man and a Polynesian woman should not fall in love due to their different skin tones. The song addresses racism head on, and makes no bones about the fact that racism, along with all other prejudices, are taught. These are not ‘natural’ ideas floating around our subconscious, waiting to be triggered by some event that makes us suddenly and irrevocably discriminatory. When left to their own devices, small children will play with other small children, delighting in their company, and not noticing their gender, their race, their language, or any other differentiating feature. They are simply small children, playing games together, making up stories, and pretending, using what is available—sometimes only their imaginations—to imitate what they have seen, and by so doing, begin to learn social behavior. They learn how to get along, how not to get along, and so many other things. But, again, left to themselves, the prejudices that may appear later in their lives, do not have a part of this time.

The lyric above is absolutely correct: people need to be taught to hate and discriminate. Love, and the pleasure it brings is the human default. Conversely, fear is the root of hatred and prejudice, though that’s not often acknowledged by most of us. And yes, we all have fears that lead us to irrational thoughts, some more benign and some more nefarious than others, about other people, other countries, other religions, and anything that drives wedges between the potential friendship and collaboration of two entities, be they humans, states, or political parties. When that happens, a door closes, and the knowledge and learning that might have been gained by both is sacrificed. Yes, some people are scary. We may completely disagree with someone about evolution, or religious belief, but when these walls go up and we dismiss the other person and their convictions, all learning ceases, and our ‘beliefs’ become hardened, atrophied, and begin to lose their merit. While we may have been on the right track, by closing off civil discourse, we have chosen to limit what we hear, learn, and ultimately understand. And all as if there is one true belief system, eclipsing all others in its knowledge and scope. It is reassuring to think there is one true belief system, and as humans, we seek comfort and consistency. But as someone who delights in the diversity that surrounds me, in my little corner of the world, I cannot imagine a world and a universe as profoundly varied as the one we inhabit could or would exist without a multiplicity of differences, challenging us to get to know and understand what is different from us. Curiosity is one of the greatest of human virtues, and from it springs intelligence. Not necessarily ‘intelligence’ as in ‘he’s an intelligent man,’ but the sort of natural intelligence that leads a person to continually seek new knowledge and new understanding of the world around them.

Believing in something, be it love, or hope, or even more man-made creations like organized religion or government, gives us a platform from which we can face the world and what it presents. And like an actual platform, or base, on which a house or bridge is built, our platforms support us, and give us a basis of facing the challenges life gives us. This begs the question, though, of whether or not our individual platform, base, or foundation allows us to be flexible, to question ourselves, to question those around us, and to discern if we are operating from a place of love or of fear. Love will give us the world; hate and fear will take it away, perhaps forever.

“I have decided to stick with love. Hate is too great a burden to bear.”

                    —Martin Luther King, Jr.