It all started with a short reflection paper that ended up with more potential than kinetic energy... About how the language used to discuss fear and sex are similar and what that has to do with the fact that they are both forces used to control populations.
I didn't even know where to begin, so I sidled up to the front desk where Khashi was bent over a notebook and said, "Hey Khashi, can we just talk about fear real quick?" Hoping that he would say something I could easily apply to sex so I could just churn out those two pages before dinner.
What was I thinking? Suddenly as I tried to sort out my thoughts everything came flooding in from where I'd unthinkingly stashed it: inspirational quotes I had never truly understood until that moment. Stage fright. Worrying for my loved ones and dealing with them worrying about me. The fears that have kept me from doing things in my life, and the ways I have fought them and tried to escape their limitations. The way people use fear to control and manipulate each other. Terrorism. Feeling vulnerable in certain situations because of my gender or the color of my skin. The sheer terror of falling in love.
It was such a massive topic that I spent the whole two pages hacking a path through the tangled mess of background information, weighed down constantly by all the baggage that comes with it. So I started talking about it. And the more I talk about it, the more pervasive it seems. I had thought fear was too heavy and too loaded a topic for people to feel comfortable discussing it; but I've tallied a mention in almost every conversation I've had over the past few weeks. It's everywhere. There's no escaping it.
And as I'm coming to realize, I don't really want to anyway.
FIGHT OR FLIGHT?
The Discovery Channel and my Psych 125 textbook teamed up to tell me how some monkeys show fear toward snakelike objects, associating them with the poisonous cobras that have threatened their lives for centuries. The physiological fight-or-flight response prepares us to save ourselves -- and any member of our species who does not develop this reaction may try to befriend a man-o-war, an angry grizzly or a masked man with a gun. Evolution votes that guy off the island.
These days we surround ourselves with alarm systems, seatbelts and safety features -- but we still find plenty to be afraid of. The world can be a terrifying place, and we walk a fine line between a healthy fear of snakelike objects and an unreasonable fear that locks us in and keeps us from finding beauty in the thrill of being alive.
CONQUER YOUR FEAR!
"Only those who risk going too far ever find out how far they can go." (That was on our fridge, holding up grocery lists and Christmas cards from people we hadn't seen in ten years.) Push your limits. The next step might be impossible, but you won't know until you try it. And then you'll know it's time to take the other road.
But that can get dangerous: what happens if you go too far? What if the next step is the last one you ever take?
The idea is: most people are capable of much more than they think they are. Most people never live up to their full potential and end up feeling unfulfilled because they were too scared to do what they really wanted to do -- too scared to ask out someone who could have been the love of their lives, too scared to leave their little towns, too scared to compete for a really good job.
My Grampi is 82 years old and every time he has a birthday he tries to do something he's never done before. When he turned 80, he traveled to India for the first time. Just this past summer I convinced him to climb up almost to the very top of Quito's Basilica, to cross a catwalk in the ceiling of the cathedral and climb up a wrought-iron ladder to look out over the entire old city. He has stepped into the unknown over and over and over again throughout his life, and he still hasn't gone "too far."
But in this phrase lies an assumption that fear is negative. It limits us and shows our vulnerabilities. We don't like weakness. We don't like being vincible.
COURAGE THE COWARDLY DOG
Cartoon Network more of less made me want to choke, this show included, but it tapped into an unusual truth.
In my days of filling my AIM info with inspirational quotes about making the most out of life and not caring what anybody else thinks, I came across this:
Courage is not the absence of fear. Courage is taking action in spite of your fear.I didn't understand it completely, stored it away but passed over it in favor of "Live like you're going to die today"... Until I talked to Khashi, and suddenly it clicked into place for me.
Last spring Fake Andrew, my poetry group, put on a show with real advertising and even an opener: the illustrious Triple Threat. I have not been a performer -- I get shaky reading someone else's poetry to ten people at Open Mic Night. So as the show approached, my apprehension built to almost unbearable levels.
Finally, I blurted out, "You guys, I'm really nervous."
All three of them stopped and stared at me. "No reason to be nervous," James laughed. From Jim: "You got this, babymomma, you know this."
After a pause, Tim said, "That's fine." We locked eyes.
And while my nervousness by no means dissipated (I still spoke too fast and stood too stiffly in the stage lights), I looked it in the eye and acknowledged it. It settled in my stomach instead of clenching in my chest.
When I told this story to Khashi at the desk, I realized that my fear helped me connect to my audience. They understood it and they understood me; they saw me shaking and heard me stumbling, and they still clapped and cheered. Perhaps more than they would have if I was calm and flawless.
Patrick Swayze's cameo in Dirty Dancing 2: Havana Nights is justified, if for no other reason, by his advice to Katey when she stubbornly declares that she is not afraid of Javier's sensuality. "That's too bad," he says. "If you can't move through your fear and connect with yourself, there's absolutely no way you are going to connect with your partner."
Partners and audiences: people who receive our invitation to judge, to whom we make available some intimate art and a part of ourselves. Performance can be like rolling over to show off our soft underbelly without knowing if it's about to be stroked or stabbed. Thus stage fright, performance anxiety, and the popular glossophobia: fear of public speaking.
A Woodstock teacher once did a meditation about his fear of public speaking. He loved it when he was young, he said, giving speeches, making people laugh, presenting an idea or representing a group. When a good friend died, he was the natural first choice to speak at the funeral, and he struggled through his grief to find a way to do justice to his friend's memory. When the day came, he couldn't do it. He couldn't speak. He just stood there, tears streaming down his face, until someone took the microphone away from him and pushed the ceremony forward.
From that day on, the mere thought of public speaking sent him into a cold sweat. And as he stood there in front of us, the whole school, he cried.
MEDITATION ON MEDITATION
Khashi introduced me to the intensely cool Ian, sophomore psych major, diver and Buddhist. Ian once spoke publicly about his fear of public speaking and how he deals with it. As he described the meditative process of breathing deep into his chest and his stomach, he breathed deeply into his chest and his stomach. As he explained how focusing on his breath slows down his racing thoughts and fears and makes the anxiety fall away, his thoughts slowed down and his anxiety fell away. Essentially, he lassoed the physiological fight-or-flight response and transformed it into a positive mental force and energy he could use in his speech. By getting in touch with his body's responses to fear he connected with the fear itself, started learning why it is there and how he can use it to be more real.
When we try to eliminate or conquer our fear, we deny an important part of ourselves. That denial pushes the fear in front of us; it becomes a wall separating us from our purpose and our audience. The fear intensifies, builds up. It separates us from things we love or things we could love but are too afraid to discover.
THE DATING REVOLUTION
Last winter someone I'd met three or four times asked me on a date. Suddenly terrified, I tentatively accepted. Sensing my worry, he responded, "Let me define date. A date is when two adults go to a specific place or function with the intention of getting to know each other better and finding out whether they are better suited for friendship or for a romantic relationship."
I was instantly more comfortable with the idea, and I understood the Caf Date in the context of the dates I used to have with my dad, with ex-boyfriends and old friends. I started to see a date as a time I set aside to focus on one person, to really get to know him or her and how we fit together in the overall scheme of things, and to enjoy one another's company without distraction.
The catch? My newfound definition of a date is an atypical one. If I were to ask random people on dates, they would surely misinterpret my intentions. Would I have to clarify what I meant every single time I asked an interesting person to join me for a meal? The prospect was daunting. Exhausting.
I finally started being hilariously up-front: "Hey, I think you're really interesting. We should get a meal sometime. It would be cool to get to know you more." I have yet to be turned down, and I have no doubt that all parties now have a few more really enriching experiences under our belts.
Ian uses his meditative tactics to talk to girls. "It sounds selfish," he said, "but when I'm talking to someone I'm interested in, I try not to focus on what she's saying. I just focus on my breathing. Then my thoughts slow down and I find that what she's saying just falls into my mind and I can communicate with her much better." Otherwise, he worries about what she thinks of him and fudges to make her like him better. In the end, he feels as though he's betrayed himself; she never met the real him and he suspects that she didn't open up in return. They never get over that awkward first-meeting superficiality and never know for sure how well they could actually get along.
A lot of people respond really well to our honesty and openness. They pick up on it and feel more comfortable with being honest and open in return, less worried about whether we are judging them, and more certain that we are exactly as we present ourselves. And yet it is a difficult habit to start.
AFRAID TO OFFEND
Some people pray. They find solace in the idea that God will give them the strength they need to face their fear and deal with the situation. Some people talk to pets, who neither judge nor respond. Talking to other people is sometimes harder because we think and respond and make judgments. We hold the capability to offend and hurt each other, and none of us wants to hurt or be hurt. We might sound stupid or make somebody else feel stupid, and we might open ourselves to betrayal by offering confessions. We might be wrong. So it can be very hard to express ourselves honestly to another human being.
Over dinner Khashi explained to me the Baha'i ideals for positive communication. First, both parties must find complete unity, "absolute love and harmony." They must ask for divine assistance, because humans are fallible and frail and we cannot do it alone. Then they must both strive to be completely frank with the other person and say exactly what they mean without worrying about offending the other person. And in turn, they must be willing to forgive any offenses spoken in honesty.
Being afraid to speak the truth only drives a wedge into the pair. Give it up to God. Say what needs to be said, fix what needs to be fixed, do it out of love and don't be afraid to do so.
LOVE & FEAR
"Love is always accompanied by fear," Khashi says, quoting the Ruhi workbooks.
That one threw us for a loop. Love? Frightening? Ha. What an uncomfortable idea.
We'd already talked about how scary approaching someone can be, but how could love, once you've found it and discovered it, still be scary? If love is supposed to be unconditional, you can't lose it, right?
There is something definitely scary about falling in love. Something terrifying in the realization that someone depends on you, someone has expectations for you, and that someone might actually live up to your expectations. Or, for the first time ever, it doesn't matter if he does or not (live up to your expectations), because for some reason you don't actually care. There is something terrifying in the apprehensive idea that you might, someday, have to hurt this person you are starting to care for so much.
And who really believes it is unconditional? What if this next confession you make is the one condition? How do you know it really is unconditional, when in fact it is only unconditional until you get fat and wrinkles and you lose your job or get kicked out of your apartment? You don't. It's all about faith.
And what is faith but realizing there is something to be afraid of and deciding despite your fear that it (whatever IT is) is true, real, or worthwhile anyway, hoping all along that you don't get thrown into the mud?
BULLETPROOF
It's amazing and frustrating to me that fearing physical or mental disorder oftentimes brings on the very symptoms we worry about. We fear death and the dark and the unknown. We fear falling victim to crime and we fear our loved ones falling victim. We fear regretting things and dying unfulfilled. We are afraid that we will always be alone. We are afraid of bees, spiders, snakes and bears; ghosts, zombies and vampires. We are afraid of conspiracy and terrorism (which, incidentally, is called terrorism for a reason -- and exploitation of fear). We are afraid to love and afraid to never love, afraid to die and afraid to never die, afraid to fail and to succeed, afraid to be... or not to be.
I could go on forever. I could come to conclusion after conclusion; I could talk about any of these topics for five pages, and a whole slew of other topics I didn't even touch on yet. Maybe I am just 20 and indomitable -- maybe I am just "being free, being wild, being bulletproof," as Bomshel puts it in their country song 19 & Crazy. Maybe I will be shoved yet into oblivion and uncertainty.
But for now, I'll leave the last word to Holiday (Mathis). On November 10 she wrote in the Star Tribune:
SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): You can sleep easy. Your fears are unfounded. Your friends won't betray you, your children won't disappoint you. Create a mantra for yourself along these lines: "I am safe and my relationships support me."
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