Creative Ways to Transform Challenges:
Dealing With Feelings

Freeing yourself from fear  Paul Ferrini
 
The ego seems to offer you a way out of fear, but how can that which arises out of fear lead you out of fear? It cannot be done. Only that which arises from a place of non-fear can show you a way out of fear...
 
Here are four simple steps that can help you...
 
First, recognize your fear. Notice the signs that fear is coming up for you: rapid, shallow breathing, pounding heart, nervousness, anxiety, attack thoughts, anger. Be aware of your physical, emotional, and mental state without judging it or trying to change it. Acknowledge it to yourself and, if another person is involved, to the other person.
 
Second, recognize that the solution the ego offers you is motivated by fear. Understand that your ego will always have a solution to every perceived problem. But, when you listen to that solution, you don't feel any more peaceful. Indeed, you often feel more charged with anger, more victimized, more suspicious of other people and defensive toward them...
 
Third. accept your fear. Get your arms around all of it. Say to yourself "It is okay that I am afraid. Let me be with my fear. Let me tune into why fear is coming up for me right now." Don't be analytical about this. Don't go up into your head. Stay in your emotional body and listen to what's there. You will know when you have listened enough because you will begin to feel more peaceful, even though you don't have a solution to your dilemma.
 
Fourth, tell yourself "I don't have to decide anything now. I can wait until my fear subsides and insight comes to make any decisions that need to be made."
 
By doing these four steps, you will bring love and acceptance to yourself. Out of this compassionate place, a non-fearful solution to your dilemma can be found.

 
From Miracle of Love: Reflections of the Christ Mind, Part III, by Paul Ferrini, Heartways Press, PO Box 181, South Deerfield, MA 01373, 1997, pp. 73-75

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