The things that scare you
Our fears are stepping stones.
Last night I couldn’t fall asleep. Ball of anxiety.
Maybe it’s the newness of a new year on the horizon and all the uncertainty therein. Maybe it’s the fact that my kid has been sick (like, really sick) three times since mid November. Maybe it’s because my Christmas plans got cancelled because my sister got Covid.
Whatever it is, I’ve sort of been sitting with this truth that we never really know what we’re going to wake up to. Life is chock. full. of uncertainty.
Most days, that’s exciting to me. The new, the unknown. On good days, I am brought alive, fully motivated by the pure potential of it all.
Other days, I’m tired. I’m grasping for any sort of control. Anything I can hold on to to make me feel safe. Like, maybe if I can just tuck the bed sheets in a little tighter, get the comforter a little smoother, I’ll feel better.
James Brandon:
“The things that scare you the most are the things that bring you closer to who you're meant to be.”
What is my anxiety saying to me? Are the things that scare us actually drawing us out in some way? Is the not-knowing drawing us in? In to some wisdom or truth?
Alan Watts:
“Because the future is everlastingly unattainable, and like the dangled carrot, always ahead of the donkey, the fulfillment of the divine purpose does not lie in the future. It is found in the present.”
This morning I woke up, made coffee, grabbed my journal. I wrote for awhile, about the things that scare me. I stared out the window as the fog cleared and the sun broke through. And then I was reminded of some things that used to scare me, how when I’ve turned toward those things, I’ve been better for it. And how they don’t scare me as much anymore.
May our fears be stepping stones, a warm, helping hand to lift us up into all that we are and all that we will become.
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Every person is unique and autonomous and actually, considered independently, the greatest artwork of all time.
—novelist Thomas Bernhard via Rob Breszny
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A New Year Blessing
May you be happy,
May you be safe,
May you be healthy,
May you live with ease,
May you create what’s true to you!
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