Fear... not - Part 4

Lack of Control produces Feelings of Fear.

Previously in this series looking at Fear, I suggested that control is evidence we are trying to fight fear.
We fear some event or circumstance in the future, and so we attempt to control our situation in order to control the outcome. BUT control is an illusion. We don't have the power to control our circumstances, but only our own attitude to or behaviour in those circumstances. It may seem like a fine point but it is a significant one.

Control is an attempt to shortcut our own frustration or pain. It's a knee jerk reaction to our fear of a situation where we otherwise feel helpless, scared or unable to be effective. But because we haven't absolute power, Control is ultimately futile. We can use control to contain a situation in the short term, but we'll never dominate it in the long run.

Control usually involves other people. Parents of a willful child will punish uncooperative behaviour, but punishment in itself does not destroy the willfulness of the child; it will contain him only in the presence of the parent, or only until he is a teen.

Spouses may dictate or even abuse a partner to get what they want, but it may also lead to isolation, loneliness, loss of intimacy and, eventually, separation.

Control seeks to get what it wants but it destroys the relationship it's trying to hold on to. If we fear another person's attitudes or thoughts, and try to repress them, though this may be an instinctive response, it's the wrong one. It may give the controller what s/he wants immediately, it may achieve superficial compliance, but it will destroy good will and intimacy, trust and mutual respect.

Trying to control others is self-defeating.

What about finding yourself in a situation where someone is trying to control you? Sometimes you are put in a path where a dominating person uses abusive remarks, criticism, or mocking to knock your self confidence or sense of purpose. When that happens - and it usually will at some point - consider it a complement. The other person, in trying to impose, dominate or control you, is demonstrating their fear. You needn't let them get to you. Remember, they haven't any real control over you - you always have a choice to agree, ignore or disagree with them. As you overcome their domination, you will see your character becomes stronger.

Sometimes people will be put in your path to try to control you. While their control is unhealthy, the situation is an opportunity encouraging you to grow. Trust that truth, and watch how you can overcome domination and control simply by being detached from their manipulations and true to yourself.

Until next week... enjoy every encounter and experience, trusting that all has been a part of your journey to becoming who you were created to be.


Love and God bless to you this week. See you next Thursday... AND:




END NOTE: For those who haven't known me for long, and perhaps for some who have: You might enjoy my other blog:
Life from the Lighthouse -- all about what God shows me when He talks to me and I listen. New posts monthly on the 1st.










My website for the Self Publishing House is www.LarusPress.com where I blog on wholeness, witness, the Word of God and worship & warfare. Larus Press offers Christian-based books, blogs and literature to inspire, encourage, equip and empower your living spirit.
Subscribe to our free newsletter, Soaring Post, with issues every Thursday to equip you for your spiritual walk.

See you next Thursday here at A Life Examined.

Fear... not - Part 3

Fear of Failure:

What is failure? Why are we afraid of it?

Although I touched on the issue of failure last week, I'd like to look into it more deeply now.

Failure is not achieving the outcome we hoped for or worked for. It is an unpleasant experience. We tell our kids the best lessons come from making mistakes, yet in schools we don't like to dwell on their lack of achievement, and anymore, kids are rarely held back or 'fail' a grade.

We certainly don't like to dwell on our own shortcomings or a failure to achieve. But the truth is, failure is like medicine; it makes us stronger. Failure teaches us what we need to learn. Then, if we're wise, we take the lesson and apply it, making success a greater possibility.

So, if failure is our best teacher, then why do we fear it? Wouldn't it make more sense to embrace it as an opportunity?

Failure is a bit like pain: we need it to tell us we're at risk, in over our heads or aren't ready for a particular experience. But we don't like the feeling of failure. Failure, like pain, hurts. We don't want to experience pain, and so instinctively we wish to avoid it. We fear it because it is uncomfortable and because - we believe - it is undesirable.

We also fear failure because it exposes our weaknesses to others. Perhaps we'd rather appear strong and confident than weak or lacking in ability, because we believe if our weakness is seen, we'll be less attractive or will receive less respect than if we appear strong, able and proficient.

But you know what? When I am vulnerable, I receive love, compassion and respect for my openness. I am affirmed in my weakness for my ability to be real. Friends draw closer and relationships deepen when I allow myself to risk failure and am open when things don't go the way I'd hoped.

Allowing others to see us at our weakest can be a scary experience. And yet those others reflect back the uniqueness that is 'us'. They hold up a mirror to us so we can better see ourselves. We might not like everything we see, but if we never look at ourselves, not only do we miss seeing the failings, but we don't see the beauty either.

Failure happens to everyone at some time or another. There is no shame in failure, but is a common experience. While it isn't something we seek, inevitably, it does find us. Isn't it just as well to get the most from it? Embracing failure when it comes demonstrates maturity, humility and confidence.

We can learn from our failures and grow.

So, let's not seek failure, but when failure does come to us - and it will inevitably - let's embrace it so we get the most out of it that we can. Embracing failure is an heroic gesture and a demonstration of wisdom. Be courageous: admit failure, learn and move ahead, stronger, wiser and more resilient than before.

Seagulls Soar: See Over All Repression*

Everything I write is geared to encourage us of all to overcome whatever tries to hold us back. Fear is a prison when it prevents us from being all we were created to be. Seagulls are survivors. They soar freely across the sky, symbolizing survival and freedom.

So, will you embrace fear and overcome it? Then you'll soar to be all you were created to be.

*Larus Press is Sarah's publishing label. To learn more see: www.LarusPress.com

Love and God bless to you this week. See you next Thursday... AND:




END NOTE: For those who haven't known me for long, and perhaps for some who have: You might enjoy my other blog:
Life from the Lighthouse -- all about what God shows me when He talks to me and I listen. New posts monthly on the 1st.










My website for the Self Publishing House is www.LarusPress.com where I blog on wholeness, witness, the Word of God and worship & warfare. Larus Press offers Christian-based books, blogs and literature to inspire, encourage, equip and empower your living spirit.
Subscribe to our free newsletter, Soaring Post, with issues every Thursday to equip you for your spiritual walk.

See you next Thursday here at A Life Examined.

Mid Life Crisis: Part 1

Mid Life Crisis at 54: Does that suggest I'm immature or will I live to be 108?!

This is a confusing post to write but I'm going to 'have a go' as they say in England.

I'm having a sort of mid-life crisis I think. Looking on the bright side, since that's an occurrence more typical of someone in their 40's, perhaps I'll take it as a sign that I've taken longer than most to grow up. Perhaps there's an equal chance I'll grow old more slowly too. Since we who are prone to emotionalism and immaturity hang on to very little stress, it's only natural we avoid stress-related illness, right? It would be nice to think there's a positive that will come out of the current mild state of confusion I'm experiencing.

I am in crisis and have been, but only for a few days. I noticed a couple of days ago that I was moving slowly, both in my thoughts and in my physical being, lost in a fog of tension and near-despair. Then last night - waking in the middle of the night - I managed to give myself a label, which gave way to a huge sense of relief. A break-thru! The second half of last night I'm sure I slept better. Today the tension and inertia are half what they were yesterday. For me, answering the 'why' is have way to a solution.

I'm sure I'm better today for having put a label for 'it' - the muddled mind, the huge sense of oppression, the pressure of claustrophobia without being in a small physical space at all. Mid life crisis. Suddenly, I'm a part of the human race again, experiencing life just the way so many others have experienced it.

What are the symptoms of my mid life crisis?

I was feeling - am feeling - like I'm sitting alone in a dark room and I want to get out but I've got nowhere to go. I have a sense that my brain has reached capacity, yet I have many more ideas to cram inside with nowhere to file them. And as for the filing, I think that's a part of what put me in this compressed 'state' in the first place... Far too many projects, responsibilities, concepts to explore, each distracting me from the others to the point of inertia. And I'm realizing, I've spent twenty years of my life in the Arts with relatively little income to show for it. I've learned a ton. In fact, I've believed all along that life is about learning (I started out my professional career as a teacher) but now, having learned, I'd like to have something to show for it outside of a million manuscript ideas, several having been penned and at various stages of draft form and a few published items.

My life is like that... a draft of what is to come. I've always lived my life like that. A planner, I've always anticipated what needed to be done to make tomorrow's load lighter. But each day has a tomorrow so the load has never seemed to get lighter.

Now, at my relative mid life, I'm thinking, "Well, what's left to explore?"

I'm wondering, shouldn't I begin to reap rather than to keep on sowing? The answer is, I don't know. But I am tired of working very hard. In fact, this particular workaholic is just plain tired.

Of course the thing about any crisis is, everything is blown out of proportion. The mind plays tricks... though usually it's laughing alone. So I'm wondering - what tricks am I a victim to, and what truths are finally getting across to me?

Well, I'm going in circles... It's time to list some blessings, in order to tell my mind I have reason to be thankful. This is to draw me toward regaining a healthy perspective:

I have a marriage that's lasted twenty years
I have a healthy eight year old son
I have a gorgeous (inside and out) step daughter with whom I get along
I have family and friends far flung across the globe
I've lived on three continents and have visited two others
I'm sure of where I'm going after this life (though to say it may annoy some of you)

What can top this list of things to be grateful for? Everyone has their 'list' and I'm grateful for mine. But the trouble is, for almost the first time in my life, I'm scared. Really scared. I'm scared I've missed something I should have done, or should be doing, though I don't know what it is. If I knew, I'd think I'd do it. But I don't. So I'm stuck - inert - in my dark room, sitting because I don't know the direction to travel if I do stand up.

I've always been a bit of a control freak. At this point in my life, I've got no agenda and no control. And that scares me. Anybody else feel like that? Oh I've matured so I can be calm on the outside, but there's such a belly ache of stirring on the inside, that I want to explode before I implode.

Except I've not got the energy to let myself burst. Instead, I tell myself I've got to keep hanging on..... to... to... to order! And maybe then, maybe then I'll hitch a ride to somewhere that isn't such hard work. Maybe.... I'll be carried away to a land where there's rest and quiet and limited stimulation, a land where I can create something that will be enjoyed by others without having to work so hard to polish it because, in the polishing, all the joy gets rubbed away in the process. Maybe there I can find peace.

Did you know that striving for perfection and for peace don't mix? - they clash. Perfection and peace are like two roads that cross, once. I know I've spent most of my life traveling on Perfection Road but I'm realizing that it's been a long and sometimes grueling path. Perhaps now is the time turn off.

I'd like to find Peace Road, but I'm not sure how to find it or, if I get to that one crossroad, which turn am I to take? I hope I haven't already reached that crossroad and ignored it. And if I have yet to come to it, how will I recognize it when I arrive?... there are a lot of other crossroads. How will I recognize the peace crossroad? And isn't it only by chance I might find it? From where I am now, how do I even know which path to take from here? And if I do get there, and recognize it, and take the correct turn, will I be glad once I've done it or will I regret it? Will I then tell myself I took the easy option? Will I feel slothful and wish I could get back on the busy road I'm already on?

Are these simply vain imaginings of a 54 year old woman? Or are they insights into what it is to come as I enter a new stage in life?

The real trouble is of course, that there are just too many roads to travel, and everyone is trying to get on the right road that will lead them to their ultimate fulfillment. And I, in my current (and probably very temporary) crisis am wondering which road I last took and where I have ended up? The labyrinth of choice has put me in a complete muddle and I'm stuck, not knowing which way, or whether-or-not to go.

I categorically say I'm still sane. But it's hard to convey a crisis yet still write comprehensively. I've shown the underbelly of my mind now, and when I press "publish" what if life will never be the same again...? But perhaps that's what a crisis is all about: prompting the mind to lead us into a new realm, as a means to allay the boredom and mundane of middle age.

I plan to move forward with open hands, unaware of what is to come, and unwilling to yield to fear.

From me to you, until next week....

Open Hands by Sarah Tun

Love and God bless to you this week. See you next Thursday... AND:




END NOTE: For those who haven't known me for long, and perhaps for some who have: You might enjoy my other blog:
Life from the Lighthouse -- all about what God shows me when He talks to me and I listen. New posts monthly on the 1st.










My website for the Self Publishing House is www.LarusPress.com where I blog on wholeness, witness, the Word of God and worship & warfare. Larus Press offers Christian-based books, blogs and literature to inspire, encourage, equip and empower your living spirit.
Subscribe to our free newsletter, Soaring Post, with issues every Thursday to equip you for your spiritual walk.

See you next Thursday here at A Life Examined.