What is fear? Is it something really really big that sometimes stands in our way, challenging us from reaching where we want to get to? Sometimes, I am confused whether fear is my enemy or my friend. I just know that it is there, playing hide and seek, nudging myself to go to strange directions.
My journey in dealing with fears involve lots of courage. I am afraid of water and swimming to me seems like a scary idea. Every time I see water, I think that I might be drown, that water will take me away. Therefore, I thought I need to fight with water, I need to be better and stronger than it. It shapes my initial goals in swimming, all I wanted was to not die, to get through the water. Insignificant, but good enough for me to get started.
All I could do was to try, try to breath, try to paddle using my legs. I chose to practice at the kids’ swimming pool just because the water level is lower. The moment I immerse my face into the water, thoughts started to come: “breath, otherwise you are gonna die”, “look at the water, it is so deep”, “watch out that area, is it near somewhere I can lean on to get some air”, “oh my God, I feel like I cannot breath now, what should I do?”. These kinds of thoughts really do more harm than good. Though I could not control them from coming, I could either not react, not develop the narrative, nor I could reply them in an accepting way: “I see”.
Fears have their ways to whisper that “hey, look out, do not do that, it might hurt you”. And even when I see it makes sense, it still does not feel empowering, it feels limited. Fears make us question, fears definitely do not bring peace. When fears are around, I do not have enough courage to swim at deeper area, to test myself out, despite knowing that I could be saved by a guard.
Yet, my fears got reduced as I made progress in swimming, as I was able to feel the water, to be more flexible, more relaxed. There were moments in which I could swim without thinking of which move I should do next, without trying to be aware of my surroundings, of the water level. It felt natural, and liberating.
Fears will still be there, but we do not need to be afraid of fears that much. Just welcome them, face with them. Interestingly, the more you dare to look into fears, the more strength you have. Fears are to show our weaknesses, our shortcomings of being a human. In fact, fears can be good parameters for us to sort out what we truly want in decision making. What we want tends to be the opposite of fears, to grow and be better everyday.
Wish you have a wonderful journey in facing with fears.
