Reflections on Fear

Over the years I have learned many sayings and acronyms relating to fear. I have found them to be useful tools in my own life journey and have also used them with clients in my psychotherapy practice.  Here are the ones that come to mind at the moment:

Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway.

Fear and excitement are two sides of the same coin.

We can see fear as:

      False Evidence Appearing Real

      Forget Everything And Run

or

     Feeling Excited And Ready

     Face Everything And Rise

Other important factors:

It is important to feel Fear when we are in danger. The emotion indicates that we need to take action. Fight or Flight might be necessary.

Most of our Fear however is Fear of the future. We often feel much more Fear of what might happen then we would feel if it did happen.

Fear may also mask another feeling. That usually happens because there were unacceptable and acceptable feelings in our families of origin. In my childhood home, feeling Fear was fine.  Feeling anger was not. Therefore, I learned to feel Fear at times when I was actually angry. Once I saw this pattern, I realized it was important that I ask myself if I was angry anytime I felt Fear.

There is so much I could say on this topic but instead I am going to end with the video that Sreejit used at the beginning of the Dungeon Prompt that inspired this post.  I find the video deeply moving.  It also demonstrates many of the aspects of fear I have addressed.