Do What You are Afraid To Do

A new chapter begins in many people's lives this week. At close of which, I find my usual philosophic verbiage threatening to choke me if I do not release a few quick thoughts. First of all, I cannot feel too grateful of the chance I have to be here. This really is a beautiful place; a sort of cocoon of safety I feel it is.

For the past few weeks a single phrase has been running through my mind. Mystically as it entered, even more mystically it has somehow become ingrained as a fixed, immovable epitaph carved into my character:

Do what you are afraid to do.

My resilience this week has been nothing short of mind-blowing. For a melodramatic, worryaholic I cannot believe how I have been able to not only survive the week—but nay! I have smiled and laughed and sailed through it with joy! There are so many beautiful people in my life! I have enjoyed so many parts of it that there really is no excuse for a long, dreary monologue of my dark misfortunes or tragic deprivations of a peaceful heart. (Mostly because there is a deprivation of deprivations, if that makes any sense!)
 
Simply the fact remains: the formidable blow for which I had been waiting has not struck. The axe has not fallen, the heart has not cracked under pressure, and the mind has not discovered any empty pockets of longing nor whipped together the lethal mixture of self-pity and ingratitude.

Upon the threshold of this new chapter of my life, there were a few, prodigiously marked fears that stormed the tranquility of my mind. One fear I discovered was not a fear at all. Though it has drained quite a bit of my energy it has been hemmed with love, pleasure, laughter, and a very unexpected feeling of familiarity and comfort. The other fear has, again, turned out to be not a fear at all! But a reason to rejoice! A victory! A feeling of beautiful escape and freedom. And, I might add with a sly little smile, the enchantments have worn so quickly away that the whole of it looks extremely ridiculous to me now. I would not wish it back for the world!

I venture a guess at what magically transformed all this dread into happy butterflies and contented smiles. I can say—without a doubt—that God must be the master behind the scene. He must be the author of this little story of my life. He must have sprinkled magical dust on my silly, dramatic heart and calmed it as only divine intervention can do.

My advice to the world today is this: Do what you are afraid to do.

If you think about it logically, if you do so often what strikes fear in your heart, after a while, you won’t be afraid any longer. Then you shall be powerful and strong and—dare I say—incredibly well-equipped to fight the harder foes of this world!

And really, most of the time, the fear of something is much greater than the object itself. It reminds me of the verse:

“I, yes I, am the one who comforts you.

So why are you afraid of mere humans,

who wither like the grass and disappear?

Yet you have forgotten the Lord, your Creator,

the one who stretched out the sky like a canopy

and laid the foundations of the earth.

Will you remain in constant dread of human oppressors?

Will you continue to fear the anger of your enemies?

Where is their fury and anger now?

It is gone!” Is. 51:12-13