Making friends with fear

Our so called ‘demons’ come in all kinds of feeling tones, shapes and inner voices.. When I get in the grip of one of mine the world turns dark for a while.. I am a kid back in that big old house with a Dad who just walked right by me never asking how my day was, the same man who laughed at my Mum for getting into a state of high anxiety.. .I may also be back in the hospital ward at 4 am having had to drive myself after waking with terrible stomach pains and being unable to raise my partner. It may be a memory of the time my older sister tried to take her life after being sent home with a one way ticket.. I may call to mind how when she first met her husband he had a dark energy I feared, almost as if I had a kind of intimation he may come to do my sister harm.

That said maybe we Willemsen women were not easy to live with, or it just may be the men in our life did not know what to make of the various disguises our anxiety, fears or demons assumed.. Now as I look back I do see where and how my fear grew too large and how, in the absence of being seen, held, soothed and understood my feelings became so scary I had to start numbing them out with substances.. .

These days I try to be with my fear.. There is a Buddhist saying that it may help us to ‘take tea with our demons’ from time to time. Buddha had to stare Mara in the face as he sat under the Bodhi tree meditating.. Jesus had to do battle with Satan in the desert.. If I want to see that as a metaphor I understand my own desert or lonely wilderness years far better now, there was a time after Jonathan left (and yes maybe even in the years before) where I felt no one could genuinely meet me in my very real feelings.. The message I was getting as they started to burst out at 10 years of sobriety was that everyone felt uncomfortable and wanted them put back in a box.. So I went to a lonely place.. and then met someone who didn’t like ‘all of that emotionality’ and all of my worst fears were confirmed.. I got judged again but I did survive even his attempts to erase me…

Luckily those years are behind me.. I do a little better these days walking through my fear and allowing myself to feel the discomfort.. For in order to grow we must be able to tolerate uncomfortable feelings for a time.. it may hurt as one of our old skins gets pulled off, we may burn up when destructive old ego protections reveal themselves for what they are.. a big defense against intolerable anxiety a.k.a. emerging life energy repressed for waaaay too long! Or emerging vulnerability and shame .. the fear (which I think we all harbor a lot more than we let on) of not quiet measuring up.

I will never probably totally understand why and how I came to carry all of these fears and demons I do at times.. But at least I can be honest about them…. and lately I even get glimpses of seeing what a liar fear can be…. at times fear IS necessary, but there are times too that it stands in our way or may even be trying to call our attention to what we most desire or has meaning and value for us.. in the end we can only tune into our inner guidance while praying for the fortitude to stand steadfast while moving forward, even as those old echoes of self doubt call out to as we begin to finally find the strength and power to turn our back on them.