March 12, 2012

Fear: Use It, Don't Lose It

Imagine life with no fear.  You know, the kind of confidence teenagers often have when they get behind the wheel of a car or make other choices as if they are indestructible as people.  I remember before I could drive sometimes calling friends and asking for rides to go to youth events at church.  We lived on top of a bluff overlooking the Mississippi River and there were roads leading down the bluff that were very hilly, curvy, and winding with a lot of blind spots.  One of my acquaintances at the time would pick me up and drive down those roads at 50-60 miles per hour, sometimes sending the car airborne.  All it would have taken is for a car to be coming the other way one time and I probably would not be sitting here writing this blog.  While my group of friends considered him reckless, we also thought of him as fearless, as if that was a good thing.

       
We often discuss fear as adults as something that holds us back from living life to the fullest and that keeps us from achieving our dreams.  There is no doubt that that is often the case.  However, please realize that fear has a very valuable purpose.  If used to our advantage, it adds a pause to our thought process giving us time to think and possibly avoid devastating decisions.  There have been several instances in my life where I chose to do something just because I wasn't going to let fear hold me back.  Some of those decisions I wish I could have as "do-overs."  Other times they have turned out well.  There is no way to accurately predict the outcomes of these decisions, but if we simply use fear as a warning flag to think something through a little more rather than consistently perceiving it as an enemy that must be overcome, we'll do a much better job of achieving our ultimate goals.