The Power of Fear

We hear about the power of love, but it is too often the power of fear which guides our movements, our words, our actions. Love takes work and effort (only think about the work that it takes to be kind to people all the time, no matter what!), while fear flows effortlessly to us through the barrage of media input, through unresolved conflicts, unaccepted feelings of anger, hostility, resentment.

Fear takes its foothold when we refuse responsibility for our lives. The moment we think someone else is responsible for how we feel, how we act, for what happens to us, in that moment we have created the single most powerful breeding ground for fear that exists. If you believe people have that kind of power over you, that could be a good reason to feel fear, who wants to feel powerless, hopeless, and subjected to the whims of some superpower?

But in truth people can only have power over us if we allow them to, and no one is responsible for how you feel other than yourself. Once you have empowered yourself by taking that responsibility, fear no longer has its foothold, it becomes slippery as an eel and slithers right through.

The power of fear is the power we give it. That's a choice.

Choose well.

Blessings.
- Darshan

© 2009 Darshan F Jessop