The Signpost of Fear

Steve Sherwood gave me a great lesson in dealing with fear. He said that fear is a trail, footprints in the sand, showing me the way to my greatness. As I was reading Mackey MacNeil's excellent blog today, the challenge of fear jumped out at me and helped me recall Steve's lesson.

But I also felt a revelation to pay attention to fear as a signpost to what will help me achieve my greatness. Not just a signpost, but a welcome signpost that will become my best friend. From where I am now, that seems somewhat remote to my mindset, but I know I have already moved a little bit in that direction.

The challenges for me are two:

• Can I discern the difference between fear of my greatness and my intuition of a less wholesome situation?
• Will I be able to trump my ego's reaction to cut and run?

From my safe position of this moment that tells me I can be the observer in any situation it is not so hard to predict a rational and self-fulfilling sequence of events. From right here I can see that I would be able to recognize the opportunity of fear and turn around to my authentic self and move from that spot. But does that happen in that event?

This is where spiritual self-discipline comes in.
What do I want? How bad do I want it?
I was recently introduced to the phrase Spiritual Self-Discipline, and realized that it was something that I had not excelled at. I was pretty good at putting myself between a rock and a soft place. The soft place seems to win a lot.

As I examine this idea of fear being a signpost, a very welcome signpost that can show me the door to my authentic self, I can entrain my brain to be more aware of that fear, and to automatically turn to my authentic self for my next word or action.

Such was the case today. Having been sent a letter from an attorney's office on behalf of someone who seemed unwilling to explain a simple situation to me in their own words, I decided to bring my authentic self to the table and open a dialogue in the hopes of enticing his authentic self. Knowing I have no control over him, I decided to express my understanding of the situation and let him discover his own interpretation. Whether it is the one I would choose is out of my control.

Having turned to the fear as an opportunity to reach out and speak from my authentic self, I am much more at peace. It's a start.