What is your greatest fear?
I still remember that journal prompt from my 7th grade English class.
I thought about my many, many fears and wondered how I could possible choose just one. I made a list and kept adding to it. I was afraid of loved ones dying, heights, not being ‘good enough’, snakes, being chosen last for gym class, failing a test, getting a bad grade, being home alone… big and small… the list grew long.
Then, as I stepped back and saw the list for what it truly was, I realized my greatest fear.
It was so clear and so simple.
It is the same today as it was for me as a 12 year old and I wouldn’t want it any other way.
As I studied my list, I realized it had all the potential to limit me – if I let it. It would be so easy. I could just avoid everything I was afraid of and I would be safe.
My life has always been so amazing that I actually have to choose to be scared.
Isn’t that kind of terrifying?
How easy it can be to lose our lives to our fears?
I was/am afraid of heights but went skydiving at 16. I had a severe phobia of missing limbs but became a hand therapist.
The hardest part is the awareness – noticing when I am making decisions guided by fear.
The world feels ever more scary. It is so easy to listen to others who will tell you to play it safe.
As a society, I think we give our fears easier than our love. We often mistake the two. We think our warnings and precautions are packaged with our love. But are they really? For sure, we don’t want to see those we care about harmed. But, what about the greater harm?
As I grow older and watch the aging process of others in my life, I notice a trend. Many of us become complacent, life becomes scarier, we become more fearful, and thus our lives are limited.
I watched my mother – once an avid traveler who moved to Paris alone become fearful to fly from Ohio to Colorado.
I was nervous to spend a few months in Peru backpacking alone in my 20s but much more fearful to fly to Hawaii for 5 days alone in my 30s.
There is something about aging that can make us limit ourselves. Maybe we have seen too much, experienced more hurts, have others we are now caring for and protecting, or maybe we just don’t feel as invincible as we did in our youths.
I recognize this in myself. And because I see it, I can face it.
I am still afraid of so many things. I likely always will be.
But, I also have the will and knowing to try, to put myself out there, to do the things that scare me.
It often starts with something small. It doesn’t mean being reckless or taking big risks. It just means not playing into and being utterly controlled by fear.
That is my greatest fear – being controlled by it and living a safe, narrow, shallow, boring, stunted, fear-driven life.
Fear the fear and then face the fear.
Life is meant to be lived.