Fear Begone!

I need to let go of all need for
fear.  Drop it like a hot potato!
Ouch.  It burns my soul, brands
me as a coward, generally, unless
I'm rushing into the path of 5 o'clock
traffic of 18 wheelers!
Fear distracts.
It provides a good excuse (to whomever)
not to do anything.
You can punish yourself with fear
as if you've done something "wrong"
and need punishment.
It's not even worth your time
to crumple it up and flick it
into the waste basket.  The fun
of throwing it away doesn't
even come close to justifying
its existence in the first place.
I try to say something positive
about everything.
Fear is useful only on the way
to non-fear.  As soon as
we can let it go, we'll never
miss having had it.
That's about as positive as I
can get about fear.
So do we have to be extremely
courageous to banish this
appendage of an emotion?
Sometimes that helps.  Once
you've conquered jumping
from an airplane, you're not
so concerned about making
a late bill payment anymore.
See what I mean?  There's a
level of perspective we can get
without such extreme contrasts.
Fear begone!  Does it leave like that
or do you just walk the other
way and it doesn't follow you?
Busyness usually suppresses
it nicely but resistant cases
need to be faced
for what they are:
Phantoms in our minds
that harass the heck
out of us because we allow it.
So whatever way you
do it, taking back control
of your life isn't and all-
bad idea, assuming
you're trusting yourself
to be in your best
interests always.



Copyright © 2012 Gary Frates