Is Fear A Useless Emotion?
Let us enter into the great debate about fear. To be sure, this is an evolutionary debate of exceedingly large proportions. In order to address this topic, we must enter the realm of planetary evolution on a much bigger scale. We must view ourselves as powerful beings who wish to evolve to our highest potential, rather than as weak people trying to cope with a less-than-optimal situation.
The first thing to note is that fear is indeed a part of our biology. The experience of fear arises from the infamous amygdala in the ancient, reptilian portion of our brains. But I do not want to debate our biological structure. I will leave that to the scientists and anthropologists of our time. Rather, I wish to challenge the experience of fear in principle and ask the following question: Is fear really necessary?
Because we are a species gripped by fear, we tend to make all sorts of excuses for its existence. The most famous excuse is that we need fear to protect us. There is a crazy belief that without fear we would all be jumping off of cliffs, running into speeding cars, throwing our money into dumpsters, and living an entirely reckless existence overall. We are told that fear keeps us sane and prevents us from doing crazy things.
But I would contend that the existence of fear places us in an extremely low position on the evolutionary ladder. It says we are no better than dogs who need an invisible, electrical fence to keep them bound to a certain physical area. In this case, the dog is so stupid about getting lost or running into traffic that it takes an electric shock to teach it to stay put.
Fear is like that in our lives. Whenever we attempt to stray outside of our current comfort zone or change our system of habits and beliefs, fear will hit us like a shockwave and warn us to stay put. And like the well-trained dog, we soon learn to do so. We become fearful of our own creative ability to evolve and change, and learn to deem such things dangerous acts. Fear teaches us to be extremely wary of our better and higher selves.
There is currently a popular mythology that fear is really our friend. This mythology purports that even though fear is a painful and soul-restraining habit, it is really a wonderful teacher or spiritual guide in some creepy sort of way. To me, this sort of reasoning speaks of the utter desperation and feeling of entrapment that our human species feels regarding fear. It reminds me of the famous “Stockholm Syndrome” where prisoners learn to identify with their torturous captors in order to survive psychologically. Are we so lame as a species that we must stoop to identifying fear as our friend in order to cope with its existence?
Let’s examine how much of a friend fear really is. Let’s start with the idea that without it you might immediately run out your front door onto the freeway and get yourself killed. Are you really that stupid? Of course not. You can actually reason out the cause and effect of running into traffic. You want to remain physically intact, so therefore you intelligently reason, without the need for fear, that running into traffic doesn’t match the current intentions you have for your life. It’s called being conscious and in command, which is a much higher level of intelligence than needing to be shocked by a cocktail of fear-based chemicals secreted from your brain.
How about all of the times that you have passionately wanted to make something of your life and fulfill your life’s purpose? Has fear supported you in doing that? Has fear said, “Go for it! You are a creative, empowered, intelligent being. You can do it!” When was the last time you heard fear say that to you? Of course the answer is “Never.”
No, fear probably said something like this to you: “You can’t do that! What will people think? Besides, you’re too stupid. Remember all the other times you failed? You don’t want to expose what a loser you are, do you?” In other words, according to fear, the consequences will be dire indeed. And just to make sure that the negative messages really sink in, all of this negative self-talk will be accompanied by miserable physical sensations of anxiety and worry, which are the closely-knit cousins of fear.
Fear is basically an inhibitor. It is not a friend. It inhibits you with extremely negative experiences, whether they be physical, mental, or emotional. Fear acts as the antidote to consciousness and evolution. When was the last time you made a good decision from a fear-based place? When was the last time you had clarity when acting from a basis of fear? And at the most basic level, when was the last time you felt wonderful when experiencing fear? Have you noticed that love is nowhere to be found when you are feeling fear?
So let’s dispense with this idea that fear is a necessary friend. Let’s call it what it is; an outdated, outmoded, primitive part of our biology and consciousness. It causes us to war with each other like animals. It causes us to lose control and behave irrationally. It makes us stupid and ineffective. Ultimately, it shuts down consciousness, love, and intelligence altogether. Fear is completely incompatible with our higher selves.
Why don’t we decide to finally live up to the higher intelligence that we are and call out the existence of fear as the useless emotion that it truly is? Unless we do, we have no hope of ever evolving beyond its fitful grasp. We cannot continue to excuse it as some necessary part of our existence, when all of the evidence points to the contrary.
Love is the necessary constant in our lives. We can live amazingly productive, creative, intelligent lives where love is allowed to reign. Fear serves only to interrupt our experience of the constant of love. Ultimately, fear interferes with our very experience of God, sometimes for an entire lifetime!
Fear keeps us corralled in littleness, whereas love urges us to expand and reach our highest potential. Fear causes us to feel alone and in constant danger, whereas love reassures us that we have the absolute comfort and support of the divine. Fear destroys the development of intelligence, where love encourages its expansion. If we are honest with ourselves, there is no contest as to which of these two things needs to go. Clearly, it’s fear.
Fear needs to be eliminated as a platform of evolution. Love is who we are and perhaps it’s time that we stop accommodating the existence of fear by assuming its necessity in our lives. It’s time that we take a stand for our highest, best selves and be unafraid to make the statement that fear puts us at an unnecessary disadvantage and is no longer welcomed here.
How does it make you feel to regard fear as an outdated, outmoded part of our biology and consciousness? Does it feel empowering? Or do you feel a reluctance to entertain such ideas? Share your thoughts with me in the comments below!
Saratoga, I’ve got it! More than a month ago, I was appointed president of the Toronto chapter, for a prestigious organization serving independent publishers of North America. In fact, this organization is the first of its kind to launch in Canada, and for one month I have made little or no move towards a launching date, much less publicizing it. I indicated to the CEO I would get going this week, and up to the point of reading your blog I still found myself as if paralyzed, making all kinds of excuses, which, now, made no sense.
What a kick in the butt! But, of how much I needed it.
A million thanks!!!!
Monica.
Monica, reading what you said here alone would make this entire blog worth writing. 🙂 This is so great. Congratulations on your new position! I’m so happy to hear that you feel ready to go forward with this.
Indeed, procrastination is usually a by-product of fear in one form or another, often about something that’s not even conscious. But, as you said, when viewed with a clear mind and conscious perspective, such things rarely make any sense.
I wish you many blessings and much love in your new venture. xoxo
Felt a freedom suddenly come over me after teading your prespective on fear .Thanks.Felt a vapor being released from my upper body.Think ben fighting fears since childhood, from a violent home,could that have been laying there in different situations?Only question is don’t young children need some form of feartill older like not putting fingers in an open flame etc.??Thanks again.
Letitia, I love what you said about a sense of freedom suddenly coming over you when putting things in this perspective. It’s like suddenly realizing that you don’t have to live as a victim of fear.
I’m not sure what your question is about fighting fears from a violent childhood situation, but if you’re asking if those same fears could come up in other situations, yes they could. If anything about another situation reminds you of what you experienced in childhood, then you could feel a sense of danger again, even if such a feeling were completely unwarranted in the new situation.
Your question about young children is a really good one. The answer is complicated because when it comes to children so many things have to be factored in. This is exactly why I said in the blog that this subject needs to be addressed on a planetary scale of evolution.
The first thing to note is that we live in a finite world of duality, where living things can be harmed and even destroyed, as in death. I believe that this is what our biology responds to. This is why we have those fight or flight mechanisms built into our biology. So we are ultimately talking about evolving out of this duality to a place where fear, pain, suffering, poverty, and death no longer exist. That would be a world of omnipresent love, which is our true home.
A young child’s physical brain is not developed enough to have the judgement faculties necessary to know not to put their fingers in an open flame. That’s why it takes a very conscious, aware parent to oversee that child’s development and help that child to learn effectively with as little fear as possible.
There is always a balance between dealing with our physical circumstances as they exist right now, and having the consciousness to envision and intend for something far better to take place. We need to expand our consciousness, exercise our empowerment and ability to discern truth, plus stay grounded and aware at the same time.
I hope this helps. Blessings and love 🙂
Saratoga, thank you! this is what we all need to do right now — is give fear the big boot! I am amazed to think that I am living with that lurking in the background as if it had a right to be there and I was just trying to brave through it, like it’s one of those options. thank you for so clearly pointing this out.
Ha ha – I like what you said about giving fear “the big boot”. That’s so funny, but also to the point. This is a great insight that you describe here, Barb. It’s a perfect description of the overall human condition. Thank you!
I know this to be truth because it feels like breath, oxygen, freedom! Light and weightless! 🙂
I love this description, Lucy! Sounds perfect. 🙂
This was so great. I never looked at fear like this. Thank u so much
You’re so welcome, Vickie. I’m glad it was helpful.
Thank you for this blog! I for one will be so happy to see an end to fear on this planet! It truly is the root of all evil! I always found it interesting that evil is “live” backwards. In my life, I have had fearless times and it created fear in my family, so I had to play it low key and have had to learn to be low key. It amazes me that when you live in a place of no fear how blatant fear is to see in others! It really scares people to see someone who is in a place of no fear. It can even make them very angry! Odd!
Ironically, I experience anxiety right now due to a medication that I am taking and I can tell you it is NOT FUN! It does help me to identify with those who live with great anxiety in their lives and it must be awful for them. This blog along with reading your book, The Final Elimination of the Source of Fear has helped me immensely. Of course meditation that you suggest and self talk helps as well. I have to challenge my self defeating thoughts all the time if I am going to move forward, and it is working pretty well. I also have a very supportive friend and husband and that helps a lot too!
My Question is – is the elimination of fear something that each and every one of us have to do before the world will change? – Susan McDonald
Susan, if you are referring to Telstar’s process entitled “The Final Elimination of the Source of Fear”, the answer is no. Everyone on Earth does not have to do this specific process. But everyone who does it with sincerity certainly helps the greater whole, because we are all one. Every time one person evolves, it lifts the greater whole.
My purpose in writing this blog is to start a thought process of exposing fear as the imposter that it is. If we can start being honest with ourselves about its real effects in our lives, we are much better positioned to hold a vision for the final elimination of this miserable and unnecessary experience.
When talking about human and planetary evolution, it is best not to look at this in a linear way or as the sum of the parts. This is what religions tend to do. For them it’s one gigantic math problem! It’s like some weird accounting ledger sheet. The answer has to be that everyone on Earth believes as the religions do. So how do you make that add up? Well, that’s easy. You simply eliminate the people who don’t believe by destroying them.
And if you’re not willing to physically destroy people, no problem! You can just say that God will take care of that for you. In the afterlife. It’s called hell. That’s where all those unbelievers will end up. So in the end, you still make your equation work anyway. All the good guys go to heaven!
Obviously, this whole approach is a bit ridiculous. It couldn’t possibly work that way, could it? The best approach to human evolution is to be in touch with your true self, live in love, and hold a vision for the highest, best outcome of life being restored to its infinite state of omnipresent love. Every person who does that lifts the space and the consciousness for everyone else. It’s like cutting a path. It makes it easier and more possible for others to follow in their own unique and special way.
That IS something that I can do and I will do my best to do so! Thank you for all you do 🙂
Not sure about that, but wouldn’t it be wonderful if everyone who hears about it just did it anyway. I’m sure that there a
re other tools and ways to do it but what we know for sure is that this one is available to us right now, and works so let’s spread the word!
I really like your perspective here, Lucy. Thank you! 🙂
This sure puts things in perspective. I find what you say above very empowering, especially the part about fear being merely an outmoded part of biology/consciousness. I think we give way too much credence to fear and all the self-critical thoughts that run through our minds. It’s as if these things carry weight merely because they keep happening over and over. Maybe we get confused and forget that they don’t really have anything to do with us at all. If we take a step back, it’s clear that fear and the ego are in direct opposition to anything that really matters to us in our deepest hearts.
So if we wish to move towards love, life and beauty and all the things that we deeply care about in our hearts, then fear simply needs to go. All it does is stand in the way.
It sure does feel empowering to take a stand for love and proclaim fear as outmoded and not to be tolerated any longer. Wow. I can’t think of anything more empowering or freeing. I personally am quite fed up with it. When looked at in this light the choice is simple. Do I want love or fear to motivate me? Which feels better? So why does it seem so difficult to make that choice once and for all? I guess it really comes down to whether I continue to blindly listen to the voice of fear or listen to my heart’s clarity and take a conscious stand as the empowered creator that I know, in my heart, I am. Could it be that simple? I guess there is only one way to find out…:)
I love this perspective, and want to clearly state that it is an outdated and unnecessary part of my consciousness. I realized upon reading this, that much of my motivation has been sourced and locked in fear, which I was not aware was hiding in the shadows. For example, … I’ve commented on your posts about wanting to put exercise into my daily routine., and you have offered some wonderful and welcoming insights, … But your forthright address to the counterproductive and ineffectual use of fear has illuminated a bright path for me to embark upon. While reading this, I uncovered that my internal dialogue for exercise was motivated by fear… And of course, I can’t sustain that, especially when I’m not even conscious of it. This is uplifting and freeing. I will not be “weighed” down anymore, by the insidious and outdated acceptance of fear. I am love, love, love and my actions will be inspired and motivated by who I am.
I agree let’s all give fear the big boot out the door!
Saratoga, I have enjoyed reading and rereading this blog very much. I agree with you that “let’s dispense with this idea that fear is a necessary friend.” I am very ready to move on in love and light. I was wondering if perhaps in the future you might also address it’s sidekicks – guilt and shame? They seem to be giving me the most challenges at the moment.
Thank you.
A real reason for fear was crossing that bridge at Selma. People were beaten and shot but they pushed past that very real reason to fear and changed lives for the better for so many people.
Daily fears pales in comparison.
What will people say? Whatever their biases impose on them.
We have a saying in the culture I grew up in: Fear eats up your Soul.
It is so true and fear comes in so many disguises, sometimes it is hard to see behind the benevolent’ veil. In me it resonates in my belly in a way that makes me feel queasy and then I remember it’s fear trying to sneak in. That’s the time to give it the Big Boot!