Letting Go of Fear

[MajestyJo]

Letting Go of Fear

Fear is at the core of codependency. It can motivate us to control situations or neglect ourselves.

Many of us have been afraid for so long that we don't label our feelings fear. We're used to feeling upset and anxious. It feels normal.

Peace and serenity may be uncomfortable.

At one time, fear may have been appropriate and useful. We may have relied on fear to protect ourselves, much the way soldiers in a war rely on fear to help them survive. But now, in recovery, we're living life differently.

It's time to thank our old fears for helping us survive, then wave good bye to them. Welcome peace, trust, acceptance, and safety. We don't need that much fear anymore. We can listen to our healthy fears, and let go of the rest.

We can create a feeling of safety for ourselves, now. We are safe, now. We've made a commitment to take care of ourselves. We can trust and love ourselves.

God, help me let go of my need to be afraid. Replace it with a need to be at peace. Help me listen to my healthy fears and relinquish the rest.

From: Messages of Recovery (Discussion Forum)

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Detachment and letting go doesn't mean I don't love, I think that is my biggest fear of all.

I have to acknowledge it before I can let it go. Thank goodness you don't have to like it in order to accept it.

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[MajestyJo]

When I came into recovery, I didn't have a clue what letting go meant. Some days, many years of one day at a time, I still don't 'do' Letting Go very well.

I didn't have a concept of letting go. I didn't know how to do it and it took going to many, many meetings and listening to others that it just seemed to happen and the light bulb went on.

I was indeed, totally in the dark about this. It was my job to worry, fret, grit my teeth, etc. I have this problem you know, not knowing the problem was me.

It has always helped to direct my thinking on something positive and helping others which in turn, helps me to not focus on me and my problems. There is always someone hurting more than me and I can put my problems in their true perspective. I had a sponsor and spiritual adviser, who use to tell me, not to call them problems. He said they are challenges. Challenges we overcome, problems we can tend to get stuck on.

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[MajestyJo]

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Facing Fear

Your fears are not walls, but hurdles. Courage is not the absence of fear, but the conquering of it. -- Dan Millman

Deep down inside, what are you most afraid of?

Don Richard Riso and Russ Hudson have identified 9 basic fears that shape our personalities:

1.Fear of being bad, corrupt, evil or defective
2.Fear of being unworthy of being loved
3.Fear or being worthless or without inherent value
4.Fear of being without identity or personal significance
5.Fear of being useless, incapable or incompetent
6.Fear of being without support or guidance
7.Fear of being deprived or trapped in pain
8.Fear of being harmed or controlled by others
9.Fear of loss of connection, of fragmentation.*
While we may feel every one of these fears at one time or another, do you identify with one more strongly than the others?

Once we’ve identified a fear, we can begin to move through it. It helped me to learn that only my personality feels fear. Soul, which bridges the spiritual into form, knows no fear because it experiences the unity of all. Fears arise when our personality misunderstands who we really are.

When we’re afraid, we can intentionally use our imagination to connect with the soul’s perspective. When the love and compassion of the soul can sit with our frightened personality, the experience of bringing the higher to the lower transforms the fears.

Both the fear and the love must come together to integrate in wholeness. Affirming love while denying the fear doesn’t work – it only gives the unacknowledged fear more power in our subconscious. To resolve the fear, we must bring it consciously into the presence of a higher power.

“Every man has a coward and hero in his soul.”
-- Thomas Carlyle


*This list is taken from Riso and Hudson’s book ‘The Wisdom of the Enneagram.’

Really like the line about fear and love coming together so we can become whole. For me, it is a very empowering statement.

[MajestyJo]

DAILY OM:

Overcoming Fear and Healing Wounds

We cannot escape childhood without being wounded. Every time we made demands of others and they refused us, we were diminished in our self-worth. Each time we asked for love and it was withheld, our self-value decreased. Whenever we attempted to prove ourselves and we failed, we lost some of our power.

As we repeated these experiences, patterns of inadequacy developed, and fears of various kinds took root in our subconscious. Then as we grew up and became more self-sufficient we worked hard at overcoming our diminished self-worth, our decreased self-value, and our loss of power. But we have not been totally successful. The reason is that underlying all our efforts are the fears buried in our subconscious. What is unknown within us usually controls us.

Typically, we do not want to face our fears. Why? Because we are afraid of them. We are afraid that they will pull us back into the experiences of failure we associate with them. So we try other strategies to succeed. We use a variety of defenses to suppress the unwanted feelings associated with previous failures and fear. And we try to consciously control our environment, people and relationships. We all have control issues!

None of this really works, but we live with it anyway. It gives us a false sense of security. But what a tremendous amount of energy we waste on avoiding, repressing, denying and ignoring what we need to face.

On the Soul Journey we learn about our fears, and how to face them. We connect with our old wounds and learn to heal them. We gain the courage we need to become more integrated and whole.

Throughout our entire life, from the moment we were born – and perhaps before – there is one fundamental desire we all have. We all want connection. We all want love – to be loved and to express love. To be loved makes us feel that we are okay as we are, that we have value and worth. And to share our love gives us the connection to our power, which is the ability to love and support others according to their needs.

Ignoring the healing of our wounds makes us unconsciously demand attention and caring from others. It makes us dependent on others in so many ways for our own sense of self.

Not facing our fears keeps us from making meaningful and loving connections with others. Fear says we are separate and we need to be defensive. It says that we cannot trust others and let them in. Fear blocks us from loving. Fear and love cannot occupy the same space. Fear is rooted in the personality, love within the soul.

The power to heal our wounds and face our fears is not found in the personality. It comes from our very essence, the soul within.


Exercises:

1. Make a list of your fears. Which ones are active in your life right now?

2. Review the last few weeks in your mind. What situations come to mind where you felt afraid or uneasy? What did you react to or resist? Behind each of these, what were you afraid of?

3. How will you deal with these fears when they surface in the future? Look for positive examples from other people on how they deal with their challenges.

Reproductions Permitted: The Soul's Journey

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Face the fear and do it anyway! Scars go deep and we seldom realize how much of them are rooted in fear.

[lcount]

Jo, This collection on "fear" is enough for several sessions or an entire women's study group that I am currently in. I see the post is "old," but the topic is right on today's problems for me. And I will copy this and take it to my study group. I truly believe that God led me to this on this chilly morning; I was surfing/scrolling and absent-mindedly (or unconsciously) clicked on it. What a blessing! Oh, so much to learn at 16 years sober. Thank you and have a wonderful day and week! Lisa :)

[MajestyJo]

Thank you for sharing Lisa. It is a one day at a time program and even though I have 22 years clean and sober, I can still find myself there. Thanks to the program, I have tools to use in today to change it either into something manageable or change it into faith. As they say, fear and faith can't occupy the same space.

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