The Vice of My Fears

04-07-11

FEAR has been my god. I have let Fear rule my life. I have let it tell me that I am weak, powerless against it my whole life. My stomach would convulse; my neck tightening like a boa constricting. My heart would race of boiling water, filling my lungs as they hammered against my ribs, desperate for air. But Fear wouldn't let me... or rather it had deceived me into thinking I couldn't.

I've been a slave to Fear, letting it lord over me. Its many voices would tell me "you can't do it!", and I would echo back "I can't do it", believing it. Fear was the most powerful thing I had ever known; it could make me do whatever it wanted; it could make me not do whatever it didn't want me to do. I was Fear's puppet, and so,  became a hermit, crawling within myself, so afraid of the outside world that I became content to stare out at life, sitting at the sidelines. I convinced myself that that was all I was ever good for, and that that's where I belonged... in the corner. I became the loner, a boy of little words. I always wanted to speak up, to act, to be a part of life with others, but Fear always kept me at bay. But when you're in the corner, people eventually notice. A shadow on the wall eventually dims the whole room. I didn't want to be pitied; I didn't want people to see my weakness. And so, I emerged from the wall benches, pretending that I was apart of the living crowd. But really, I never left the sidelines.    

Over the years, I began to think that Fear was a childish thing, and as I grew older, I convinced myself it didn't exist anymore. However, it took on new faces, far more subtle and invisible: Worry. Worrying was what adults did, and it just was apart of the growing-up package. So was Fear's deception. Fear convinced me that I wasn't infected by it, and thus I never thought I needed to be treated or cured. I was convinced I didn't need help.