Breaking the Cycle of Fear

“The reality is that most of us communicate the same way that we grew up. That communication style becomes our normal way of dealing with issues, our blueprint for communication. It’s what we know and pass on to our own children. We either become our childhood or we make a conscious choice to change it.” ― Kristen Crockett, The Gift of Past Relationships  

Soundtrack for this segment: Jason Mraz – “Life is Wonderful” 

The human experience is cyclical. Some cycles are very good, like the seasons, or when you have a wonderful family. A Family that teaches the children to be wonderful and those teachings continue down through the ages. But what breaks cycles? Experience breaks cycles. You may be thinking like I am that a wonderful family being a wonderful family down through the ages is preposterously wishful thinking. And it’s true that such a thing is hard to find for generations long stints. Most families have someone in them who didn’t have the greatest integrity or was just downright nasty person. But look at the experience surrounding those people and you’ll see how reacting to an experience out of your emotions can change you, alter your trajectory. Some experiences can heal, others destroy.

We react out of emotion. Emotions are what make us human, everyone has them, everyone has to deal with them on a moment by moment basis. Now, simplify all the emotions that we experience and know that Love and Fear are the foundations of all that we feel. All negative feelings come out of Fear, but all positive feelings come from Love. To truly break any cycle you have to consciously choose to not act from Fear, but to react with Love.

I see so much Fear in the world, because I see Anger, I see Hate, I see Greed, I see Stubbornness all of these come from Fear. But when Fear is met by Love, Love will always win out. I think of September 11, 2001, when the planes hit the towers. The hijackers of those planes lived in Fear, and Fear is what caused that experience to happen. Because those hijackers lived in so much Fear they felt it was their duty, calling, whatever you want to call it, that they force Fear back on those people they felt were responsible for making them live in Fear. So they struck a symbol and millions were hurled and crumbled into living that Fear.

So let’s talk about Fear for a minute. I’m not going to give you the definition of fear because we’re not talking about that. You’ve probably felt the Fear most of your days on this planet. But let’s instead clarify how all your different negative emotions are Fear. Let’s take 9/11 again, of course there was pure fear being felt by the victims of those attacks, but how does what the hijackers did come from Fear? Take all the suppositions or determinations about why they did it: To punish America for the government support of dictators, wars on their people, our military involvement in the region, taking their land; torturing, kidnapping or vanishing their citizens, I could go on and on. All of that hatred, all of that Anger, comes from Fear.

American Government support of dictators: Fear that they have no control over their own lives. American wars perpetrated against their people: Fear that they will lose their lives. American Military involvement in the region: Fear that their family will not be safe or lose their lives. Taking their land: Fear that they will have no place to go, lose everything they have built for themselves. Torturing, kidnapping or vanishing their citizens: Fear of losing a loved one.

That Fear leads to Anger at what is happening, Frustration at the circumstance gets added in, and the Anger and Frustration if not met with Love at some point leads to Hate. Then when you have this Hate only fueled by more people feeling this Fear cacophony it leads to what we saw that bright September morning. For us to truly change the world, break the cycle, we have to confront that Fear with Love, as individuals and as a whole. As with anything the earlier you confront the Fear with the Love the more chance you have of stopping it in its tracks. The longer you let the Fear grow the greater challenge Love will have to fight it off. If you let the Fear grow to where it got to on 9/11 then you will only see the Love in the aftermath, cleaning and healing those touched by the explosion of Fear. But Love will always come meet you, and Love is always there for you to call on. Love is always the right choice to be made and to make. If my choice is to choose Love or to stay still and let that Fear grow, to not rock the boat; Baby grab your life vest if you can’t swim because I want to choose to dump everyone in the waters of Love.

But let’s be real here, to not feel Fear would be unnatural. To say, “I’m never going to Fear again” would not only be deluding you’re self but would be an exercise in futility. We are basically wired to feel Fear. The main key to breaking the cycle is to relentlessly and consistently meet the Fear with Love. In the small ways and the life changing ways.

I listen to NPR every morning, and every afternoon. I like the politics, and I have a need to hear about my fellow man. A question that I often hear is “When do we have a responsibility to be the police or the humanitarian of the world?” It’s a typical American Journalist question that I would love to answer now. We always have a responsibility to care for our fellow man.

I don’t care who you are, what you believe, what color of skin you have; I have a responsibility to Love you. I have a responsibility to care for you and what you are going through. I have a responsibility to help you in times of need. I have this responsibility for EVERY PERSON ON THIS PLANET. And you have that same responsibility as well.

Until we all realize that, that we are not separate, we are not as different as we would like to believe; Fear will continue to permeate our societies. But once we do realize this. That we are all feathers in the same bird, we are all crystals on sand on the same beach we can and will join together in Love and defeat the fear and tragedy in our lives together.