“Stop acting so small, you are the universe in ecstatic motion.” – Rumi
Fear, as a quick shake that says, “Hey! Don’t walk out in front of that on-coming bus!” serves a useful purpose. We need that jolt of adrenaline to alert us and make us move. Fear, as all emotions, is a God-given aspect of being human. The problem comes in when fear becomes a chronic attitude—a way of life. When fear becomes our go-to lens, we have, as my British friends say, “lost the plot” (AKA – become very confused!). Chronic fear narrows our focus. Everything looks calamitous. There is no hope. All is downhill and we are headed for a frightful end. The funny thing is, the more we see so narrowly and with such impassioned emotions, the more we take actions based on these perceptions. And you know where that leads – to the frightful end. By admitting no ray of light, we foster the very thing we fear. The good news is we don’t have to do this. We have options!
F.E.A.R. – It can stand for “Forget Everything and Run” or “False Evidence Appearing Real.” It’s up to us to decide which it will be. When we’ve scared ourselves silly with our worrisome thoughts, of course we want to do the former. We’d love to find the escape hatch. But we can do better than that. We can instead see habitual fearful attitudes for what they are—“False Evidence Appearing Real.” Oh, the facts are what they are—and they may be very difficult. The thing is, they never have the last word. The facts do not determine the outcome. The facts do not determine the quality of our life. We have within us the Christ—God individualized as us. All of the power of God is active in us—moving, working, creating. In spiritual terms, God’s movement in our lives is what Jesus told his disciples about—the Divine Counsellor, the Holy Spirit. That means that for every human problem there is a Divine solution.
No matter what the facts are, the Truth is always greater. God is the very ground of being and nothing is bigger than that. Every bout we have with chronic fear is an invitation to choose what we will give our creative power to. Do we want to be dominated by those will-o’-the-wisps, cynicism and defeatism or do we want to live in connection with the power of God? F.E.A.R. –what does it stand for? You choose.
In the Love and Light of the Christ,
Rev. Anna
