FACE YOUR FEAR BUT SHOW NO FEAR

Some time this week I had to run an errand for my mum. Little did I know that I was gonna have to pass through the "valley of the shadow of  death" / the "belly of the beast" to get there.


I had some problems locating the place at first, till I stumbled upon a gentleman who was kind enough to walk me to my destination. On arrival though, the gentleman departed and I knew I was going to have to face the journey back alone.


After a couple of hours, I had completed my business and it was time to leave. Just as I thought, the terror still awaited me. However, I had recently seen a movie about a guy who entered a lion's cage in the zoo to fix the gate, he was scared but he showed no fear and stared down the lion when it approachd him. So, I decided I would show no fear, I would act as though I belonged and it was "sure for me".


I was midway through when I hit a little roadblock in the form of puddles of blackened germ ridden water, I was more afraid of falling into the water than I was of the dragons around me so as I approched the little bridge , I stumbled and then I squealed ( just like a girl). That was a huge mistake because I had exposed my weakness and I had shown fear. Before I could blink, the dragons had approached me and were sending threats in my direction, but I quickly pulled back my armour and managed to escape unscathed.

That got me thinking on my way back home, that my perceived lack of fear was what got me out of that situation. Even though I was in a state of panic and I was filled with dread, I managed to cover it up with a facade of confidence.


I decided then that it was ok to be afraid, to be scared, as long as the fear did not cause you to freeze when you had to flee or flee from situations that had to be faced. I thought back to a quote from Mandela "I learned that courage is not the absnce of fear, but the triumph over it. A brave man is not he who does not feel afraid but he who conquers his fear"

It hit me then, that the horror movies were right, the monster or whatever bad guy fed on fear, for instance FREDDIE in 'The Nightmare On Elm Street" or "Freddie vs Jason". "The Hole" is a classic fear based movie, everyone of the actors had to face and fight their fear .........or die, they had to expose themselves to their deepest fear and one that was done, they were free.

Fear strenghtens whatever we are afraid of, gives it an advantage over us. Exposes our weakness when we ought to show strenght. We all have fears, it is what we do about it that makes the winners and the losers. I daresay "only a fool has no fears. a wise man knows what he fears, looks it in the eye and walks away"

I have an irrational fear of cockroaches, but that does not mean if I found one on my bed I would run away! If I did, I probably ran to pick something to kill it with.

Eleanor Roosevelt said "We gain strength, and courage, and confidence by each experience in which we really stop to look fear in the face... we must do that which we think we cannot."

 And as Joel Osteen said "Faith activates God, fear activates the enemy". Need I say more?