When Fear Is Crippling

Weekend Writing Prompt Response: Prompt 5: “Fear”

Fear is something that every human deals with at some point in their lives. It can come in many shapes and forms, and it can sneak up on us when we least expect it.

Fear is usually associated with the future. We fear what we don’t know.

Like if you are in a dark alley, you fear what is around the next corner, or you fear that somebody is going to jump out of the shadows.

We fear snakes or spiders because we think that they will bite us.

We fear flying because the plane might crash.

We fear eating new food because we think we may not like it.

We fear climbing a mountain because we might fall off.

We fear skydiving because our parachute may not open (this one is for you Anne!)

Fear comes in many forms.

But do you see the pattern here? Fear is a thought we have created in our minds that has no solid existence in the world. Nothing has happened, yet, but we fear it nonetheless.

It’s honestly the most irrational emotion that one could have.

I learned a pretty heavy lesson about fear in Morocco when we were there during the initial covid lockdowns in 2020.

For the first few weeks of the lockdowns, I was in an almost paralyzing state of fear.

I had thoughts flashing through my mind that Morocco would run out of food, that people would chase the foreigners out of the country because we were taking up their resources. The craziest fear I concocted in my mind was that I would see dead people in the streets. To top it off I figured that cats would be eating the dead bodies!

This is BY FAR the most irrational I have been in my life, and I was the most haunted by fear than ever before.

But one day I realized something. I realized that in each moment of each day, I was safe. And I realized that if I focused only on that moment, and stopped the neverending reel of fear that was playing in my mind, I was much more present and productive.

It was then that I was able to pull my vision back. I pulled it right back to what was right in front of me.

“I am safe in this moment.”

I repeated this statement to myself over and over, sometimes many times per day, until it overshadowed the other thoughts. Over time my breathing stabilized, my nerves calmed down, and the knot in my stomach subsided.

It was then that I was able to move forward.

Fear paralyzes us in place. Our brain can’t make proper decisions when we allow fear to take over. Fear is a concoction in our minds. It’s a make-believe world that we create.

Of course, fear is justified at times, but most times it is unnecessary.

There have now been other times in our travels where I have felt fear creep in. Like when we took the bus from Egypt to Sudan, I felt fear. I had no idea what we were getting into and had heard my fair share of stories about the dangers in a country like Sudan.

But along the way, I pressed myself to stay present, to stay in the moment.

Moment by moment there was nothing to be afraid of.

Moment by moment we were safe.

Like during my scary time in Morocco, my fears about Sudan never materialized either. In fact, Sudan may have been the safest country that we have ever been to, and the people were some of the loveliest that we have met so far on our travels.

So I guess this is a lesson for us all.

What are you fearful of? What ideas have you placed in your mind that have no validity?

Most importantly, what fears are holding you back in life?

We have no control over what the future holds, we can only do our best in each and every moment, and make decisions that suit us now. If we can pull back our perspective to this simple time, we will feel better and will make better decisions moving forward.

I hope my experiences with fear will help others to process theirs.

Thanks for reading and thanks again to Jason Edmunds for another inspiring prompt in his publication A Taste For Life.

xo Jill

To read some of my other weekend writing prompt responses:

Hi there, we are 2 Canadians, Jill and Chris from Artistic Voyages. We have been nomadic since 2017 living in numerous different countries, and experiencing the life and diversity of our planet on the ground and firsthand. We have now been on the African continent for over 2 years!

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