The Skeptic

I have found that allowing what I fear to exist independently of my fear of it, is extremely helpful. This is called bracketing, popularized by Heinrich Husserl. Bracketing is used in research and is part of Husserl’s philosophy called Phenomenology, which I studied as an undergrad. Simply put, we can take our fear of something out of the equation, bracketing it, temporarily separating it from its other parts, so we can examine and study it with greater objectivity. If I fear Spiders, I can bracket my fear and look at the other parts of spiders, they eat insects, they live everywhere, they are beautiful and delicate, they make amazing webs, etc.

Bracketing is part of the Cognitive Behavioral Therapeutic (CBT) process as well. For instance, I have explored the fear artists often have, which go something like, “what if I’m no good,” “what if my idea doesn’t sell,” “what if I waste all these expensive art supplies,” etc.?  I also fear the “un-self conscious line,” the mark that is completely out of control, beyond control, true freedom. It is something artists yearn for and fear at the same time. God help us if I could ever let go that much! I remember a local gallerist pining for the moment when she could finally allow such a mark to exist.

Fear of failure is very debilitating, and it is very common. To look at failure, bracketed from our fear of it, can be very helpful. What is failure to me? What is my idea of failure? What does success look like? We may find we are more afraid of success than we are of failure. Fear of success is a real thing. We’re so afraid we won’t know what to do with success, that we won’t be able to handle it, that we’ll botch it somehow, that we create obstacles to make sure it never happens.

Let’s take another fear of mine as an example of how we can name, explore and embrace our fears. For the last several years, I have suffered from chronic pain. I’m afraid pain is taking over and controlling my life. How do I learn to coexist with something so omnipresent, like chronic pain?  By exploring the component parts of our fears, using bracketing and other techniques, we can learn to understand and eventually embrace them. When I say embrace, I am talking about integrating our fears into our lives in such a way that they no longer control us. Here are a few suggestions I have about facing our fears in a healthy way:

1) Name it. Make a list of all the things we fear. I am afraid of ______. Sometimes, just naming a fear is enough to drive it away. Saying it out loud helps us realize how ridiculous it is. List the things we believe we fear and explore each one by bracketing it and examining it objectively. Lay it bare. If we are honest with ourselves and willing to do a little emotional digging, the fears we think we are experiencing may lead us to the actual fears that are debilitating us, which are often lurking underneath the surface. For instance, underneath my fear of making that un-self-conscious mark lives my fear of not being good enough. Arrange them in order of what we consider the most severe to those that are not that big a deal.

2) Explore it. Next, ask we ask ourselves what we can do about them, one at a time. Determine what is within our power to mitigate with each of these fears. Some things we cannot control. So, try to determine those things we can control and think of ways we can change them. Let the things we cannot control slip away. Make a list and check them off as you do them.

God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference. – Serenity Prayer

Happy Place

3) Allow the fear to be, without giving it more power than it deserves or requires. Recognize that fear is not a real thing, like a mountain or a table. It may feel like a mountain, but that is only a metaphor. It is an idea and ideas can change. It is our feelings about the thing we fear that seem real. But feelings, though absolutely valid, are mostly the product of our imagination. Imagination is the key to the process. All fears start with thoughts, which can be changed with a little effort, a little imagination. I find reframing the thought helps. “I’m not good enough” can be reframed: “I’m upset because I’m not living up to some imaginary mark.” Teasing apart what is real about the thing we fear from what we have added to it by our conscious or subconscious mind is sometimes quite a process. One thing is sure, over-generalizing statements like “I’m not good enough” need to be teased and explored to get us to the real fear we are dealing with. But this is how we learn to understand our fears. I find auto writing is an excellent tool to get to the bottom of my fears. Write down everything you know about the thing you fear. Then go through and circle what is objectively true. Also, try following the logic of because. “I’m afraid I’m not good enough, because I’m afraid I don’t fit in, because I’m old and fat, because I don’t eat right and exercise.” We may stumble onto a fear we didn’t know we had, about which we can actually do something.

4) Face it. Learn about the nature of what we fear. Research it. Question the veracity of our fear. Is it really all that big and scary? Use that amazing intellect, imagination and reasoning power God gave us in this process to deepen our understanding of the thoughts behind our fears. I highly recommend finding a good counselor/therapist to guide you through the really big fears. For me, the biggest fear I faced was my fear that I was “damaged goods, beyond repair” because of the CSA trauma I experienced. I was afraid the only answer for me was suicide. CBT and Exposure Therapy are among the many reasons I am here today.

5) Embrace it. Don’t let fear stop us from doing what we love. Separate the fear of something from the thing itself (bracketing). The best remedy for many of our fears is doing the thing we are most afraid of doing. We start in a safe place and expose ourselves, little by little, until discussing and/or experiencing the thing we fear produces little or no fear. This is called Exposure therapy, and it is great for phobias. It’s also great for facing and embracing (integrating) our deepest fears. We explore our fears in a safe place. Tell the story of how the fear shows up. The key to exposure therapy is repetition. Tell the story over and over until it loses its SUDS (Subjective Units of Distress Scale). Keep these affirmations close at hand as you explore your fears: I am not my fears. They are not who I am. They are not my identity. They exist separately from me. I am whole and complete regardless of my fears. It could be argued that we are made up of some combination of the things we love and the things we fear. What we consume/believe can easily become who we are. Integrating those things we fear, understanding them, accepting them, and embracing them, puts them in a place where they can no longer harm us. For instance, I fear losing my home to some unforeseeable financial catastrophe. It’s only because I have a home that I can fear losing it. Fear of losing stuff can be very debilitating. I guess that’s why we have insurance.

Wild Things

Here are a few more examples of some very deep and scary fears you may or may not share with me: I’m afraid I will die before my time. I’m afraid my spouse will leave me. I fear my children may die before me. Or my wife. I fear that my legacy will die with me. I fear dying alone. I fear I am failing as a father. I fear there may not really be a heaven when I die. I fear for the future of my country. These are but a few of the many fears I have lived with, explored, faced and embraced, using the steps above.

The process of dealing with and embracing our fears and insecurities leads quite nicely to developing self-love and eventually truly being able to love others. That’s because at the bottom of every fear is a desire for love. We cry only in the face of beauty. Integrating and processing our fears allows us to learn the lessons they are meant to teach us. For instance, by integrating (embracing) my fear/trauma around CSA, I have learned greater empathy, self-acceptance and I found peace. It has not been a straight line, and the path can be difficult, but discovering and embracing our fears will lead us inevitably in the direction of peace.