On Fear

“Move outside the tangle of fear-thinking.
Live in silence.”

JELALUDDIN RUMI
(1207-1273)

Fear can be a terrible thing when misplaced. I think it has the power to blind us from the real danger, which leaves us in a worst place than not experiencing this evolutionary life-preserving trait.

The self-help solution to most psychological problems or imbalances that we face in the West originates from lack of self reliance. We expect other people, our partner, our employer, out neighbour, our kid’s teacher, our national health system, our government, to fix ‘it’ for us, whatever ‘it’ means. We are consumers, and they are the providers. So if there is some dissonance in me, they need to know how to diagnose and they need to provide me with the remedy.

But what if there is none? What if no one can relief the pain and the fear, because it is founded in Truth? I think at that point we need to remove the blinkers from our eyes, and allow ourselves the basic right that we all deserve: To grow up. To fully understand what it means that we only have ourselves to rely on, and if we do not let ourselves recognise that, then we are bound to remain that poor baby stuck in a cot crying his eyes out.

Photo by Kat Jayne on Pexels.com

Let me finish this post with Rumi’s inspiring full poem:

JELALUDDIN RUMI, Selected Poems, Penguin Classics

(1207-1273)

There is a community of the spirit.
Join it, and feel the delight
of walking in the noisy street,
and being the noise.

Close both eyes
to see with the other eye.

Open your hands,
if you want to be held.

Sit down in this circle.

Quit acting like a wolf, and feel
the shepherd’s love filling you….

Be empty of worrying.
Think of who created thought!

Why do you stay in prison
when the door is so wide open?

Move outside the tangle of fear-thinking.
Live in silence.

Flow down and down in always
widening rings of being.