By Howard Peiper
As the New Year approaches, and the anticipation of keeping promises to make resolutions and changes comes to the forefront, fear often grows like an insidious virus that our minds and emotions create to stop us from moving forward. Compounded with all the “2012 hype,” predictions, and end-of-time prophecies, this sickness can spread like wildfire, and we risk becoming paralyzed and forgetting that the energy of fear can be redirected into a catalyst for action.
Fear is the minds/ego’s way of saying, “I’m not going there! I like being right where I am. I’m familiar with my current state [comfort zone]. If I plunk myself right down here, nothing can hurt me because I already know this territory. I’m not worthy, and if I stretch myself I might get rejected.”
Fear means we are not willing to venture into the unknown, not willing to take risks, not willing to accept and adjust to change. Fear is about ignoring imperatives to change, putting our head in the sand and expecting the problem to go away, allowing others to control our life because we may not have the courage or confidence to control our own. And fear always leaves our life messy, miserable, and myopic (limited in scope).
We may not actually be aware of the grip fear has over us, and even if we are, we sometimes feel powerless to change because of past, tightly held beliefs.
But fear can be our ally. If we feel it, it is a siren call to change! When we bump up against fear, we know we are called to move forward, be bolder, take a well-calculated risk, flow with the change imposed on us, make the course correction we’ve been resisting, cross the seemingly impenetrable barrier, strike out on our own, or act in our own self-interest.
Moving Beyond Fear
When fear is knocking at our door as we look to open it and walk through the threshold toward 2013, we can do the following to turn it into a positive force of change:
- The flip side of fear is faith. If we are experiencing fear, then something is pressing us to change. Where does that urgency for change originate—in our heart, in our spirit? Let go and trust. Allow faith to spring forward and trust the process.
- Get clear. If part of our fear is confusion about what steps to take or where to head, spend time in silence asking questions. Reach out to someone else who can counsel us through the process of getting clear or put our options in writing.
- Bring it out into the light. The more we look at fear from an objective standpoint, as if we were not in our body—bring it out, hold it to the light, and examine why it’s making us crazy—the more power we have to eradicate the fear we are harboring.
- Recalibrate our limiting beliefs and go for expansion. Look at the beliefs that are causing us to hold onto our fear. What’s real, what’s not? Make a list of these limiting concepts. Then list the opposite possibility and unlimited belief that we could be holding.
- Talk it out. Find a positive, good-listener friend, someone who is used to stepping through fear, or perhaps a counselor or advisor. Talk about what we are feeling. Be open to feedback. Be inspired by other people’s courageous acts.
- Fear is just thoughts and emotions—those can be changed! Fear is just something we created in our mind. It is not real. It is simply a virtual prison that we can choose to make disappear by hitting the delete button!
- Stop clinging and start living—embrace the unknown! Life is an exciting e-ticket ride with everything we want if we will simply embrace the unknown. But if we persist on clinging to the known, we will never experience it. Greet the unknown future with a warm welcome and magical things start to happen.
- Remember who we are. We are an unlimited being with a mandate to live in joy. Fear has no place in our abundant, richly rewarded life.
Dr. Howard Peiper, N.D., nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, has written several bestselling books on nutrition and natural health. His website is: www.walkthetalkproductions.com.