Last year I enrolled on a course about Contemplation,^[1] and initially found it totally confusing. Asking a Friend who had completed the same course what it was all about, his answer was simple: “It’s about moving from a position of fear, to one of love”. Yes. That made sense. A lot of sense. Fear seems always with me, restricting my decisions, making me defensive, jumping to cut off potential criticism. Not only do I feel the fear, but I then get frustrated with my fear, feeling annoyed with myself and self-critical, wanting to push this fear away, out of my life. It’s a double whammy!

But how to change this? How do I move from fear to love? When I feel fear, I often want to push it down and avoid it, or just ignore the difficult feeling and go and do something nice instead. But I know the answer is to go towards the fear, to explore my fear, to seek to understand it. Some of us live lives that are very fear-free. But many of us are influenced and limited by our own fears and the fears of those around us. To live life to the full, to be free of manipulation, requires understanding our own relationship to fear. It is our relationship to fear as much as fear itself that is the key.

But how do you move towards love when fear seems everywhere? Throughout 2022 Russia shocked the world with its decimation of Mariupol and other Ukrainian cities, and the horrific treatment of civilians in occupied towns. It is hard not to identify with the families, the old people on their own, huddled in shelters that then themselves become targets; attempting an evacuation, only to be shelled again. It is awful, dreadful stuff that challenges our faith in everything; whether human nature, God or hope itself. It is hard not to let our fears escalate to further horrors of what might happen. And in that escalation we include ourselves, that we will be affected, not just by rising prices, but by the possibility that we might become targets as well. 

And before this war there was COVID. Through COVID we learnt that we should avoid each other, fear contact, give each other a wide berth, stay in, don’t hug or shake hands, and look disapprovingly at anyone who appeared to be blissfully enjoying themselves with others. With relief we are now learning again to be close to others, to resonate with other human bodies, to gain that reassurance, enjoyment and sense of humanity. But it is noticeable that our fearful habits, once learnt, can be hard to shake off. It is as if the level of “normal” fear has been adjusted up a notch or two.

There may be an age dynamic in relation to our fears. My 88 year-old father does not feel fear in the same way as I do. He has seen and survived more, he can see his own death on the near horizon, and he is much more likely to respond with disbelief or anger, though fear may still be buried down there. Maybe he is further on his spiritual journey than I am. 

We all have different fears, and some of us have more than others. The task we face as we mature is to identify our fears and to know ourselves, so that we can see the impact these fears have on our thoughts, behaviours and choices. Hidden (and not so hidden) fear restricts our lives, makes us defensive, mistrustful, and is damaging to ourselves and others. Our challenge then is to recognise our fears, acknowledge them, and understand them, so that we can live alongside      but not be controlled by them –      so that we can live fully.

What is fear?

“Be wary then; best safety lies in fear.” Shakespeare (Hamlet, Act I, Scene III)

Fear could be defined as our core technique for staying alive in the face of threat. We are designed, like all living organisms, to protect ourselves from predators. It is a very natural feeling. I see three broad, interrelated types of fear: 

●      The fear of an immediate threat, whether real or imagined, when our survival is at stake.

●      Anticipatory fear, as when our stomach sinks in dread at the prospect of public speaking, leaping off a diving board, or meeting someone. I think this can be split into two parts:

• Our internal fear-based belief systems from early childhood that link our actions to feared consequences: e.g. ‘if I complain I will be rejected’, ‘if I speak up I will be isolated and abandoned’.

•  The fear of ageing and death, of losing control and competence.

Fear as a response to a threat is a visceral feeling, triggered by the amygdala at the base of our skull; the start of a rapid response system that tells our body that we are under threat, and releases adrenaline to fire up our sympathetic nervous system. The blood rushes to action stations and, in an instant, we become super alert, ready to fight back or to run as fast as we can away from the problem. If the fear is overwhelming and we can neither fight nor flee we will move into a freeze state or collapse. It is all part of our hard wiring to survive.

Speeding back 30 years: newly arrived in Ethiopia, keen to see the country, I had a car and guidebook, but no one to explore with. Undeterred, I set off on my own, choosing Debre Zeit (now Bishoftu), a nearby town with a crater lake, for my first adventure. I didn't know what I was supposed to take, so, as well as my beloved Olympus OM1 camera, I packed money and my passport. As I parked at the lakeside, children materialised from nowhere, clamouring to look after the car. I passed by them and headed off for the lake, rucksack on my back and camera slung round my neck. I was instantly entranced by the beauty of the place: the lake sparkling blue in the sunshine, nestling in its wooded crater. Partly enjoying how lovely it was, partly wondering if I was wise to be out by myself, I set off round the path. My discomfort increased when two men appeared and started talking to me. They pointed to my camera. I shook my head. I was trying to convince myself that I didn't know what they wanted; I hoped they would go away. Another young man appeared, and got the other men to leave. He spoke some English and told me that they were very bad men, ex-soldiers. They were no good, but he would be my friend and guide. I didn’t trust him one bit. He chatted away and I realised that he was encouraging me to walk too far from the town. The path was getting darker and more overgrown, and I didn't feel comfortable. Resolutely, I turned around. He protested, telling me how beautiful it would be round the corner. I was determined to get back, and I started walking; I was putting a brave face on it, but I was feeling more and more uncomfortable. I was definitely afraid. He suggested he take a picture of me – I refused – and we kept on walking. Another man joined us. I walked faster. We were nearly at the car park. “It’s ok,” he said, “we are nearly back. You are safe now”. He stepped back to let me continue.

Suddenly I was on the ground, he was on my back, hands around my neck, squeezing out my breath. As time stopped I had just two thoughts: one, that his intention wasn’t to kill me, he just wants the camera, so if he did kill me, it would be a mistake. But not a good mistake. The second is that I needed to get the camera over to him as quickly as I could. My instincts kicked in. I didn't panic: the camera was somehow over my head and into his possession in seconds, and a few minutes later I was collapsing by my car in a shaking, sobbing heap. I knew what I needed to do to survive. Fear was helpful here, making sure that every part of me was working together. Most of the time, however, we don't need this alertness. Our fear response system is designed to help us escape sabre tooth tigers: it’s a bit like relying on a Ferrari to do your weekly shopping. This response system gives us a negativity bias, i.e. negative things, emotions and experiences can have a much greater impact on us than positive ones. We remember negative experiences more, and when we want to make a decision, we can value the negative aspects of an event more heavily than the positive aspects. My negative experience acted as a powerful stimulus to learn Amharic, as I believed this would make a material difference to my safety. And I believe much of my progress through life has been driven by fear: the fear of failure, of not being good enough, of not meeting expectations. 

Childhood fears and fear-based beliefs

Fear has many names and takes many shapes. Some people are afraid of spiders, or cows, others of crossing bridges. Our deepest fears are instilled in us from infancy, and in the womb. At my core, I fear abandonment and rejection, and I am starting to realise how much I fear ageing, and the associated loss of choice, health, friends, family, and mobility. Other people may have a core fear of humiliation, of being annihilated, of death. Some fear being forgotten, being lonely, losing their power, their identity; some their livelihoods. There seem to be an infinite number of fears lurking around. These fears are essentially protective: they were established when we were little as a code for keeping ourselves safe, and they may have worked well at that point. Some may have been created by a traumatic event, such as being attacked by a dog, or a car accident. Other fears, such as of snakes, may be hard-wired into us from generations of learning that these animals can be dangerous. These are the fears that therapy, or other ways of learning about ourselves, helpus to surface. Often hidden, they form limiting beliefs that restrict the risks we are prepared to take, in what we do, our relationships, and how we use time. These fears keep us small, and, as such, safe, but they stop us being anywhere near our fullest selves.

Anticipatory fear

All fears are protective, arising from the inbuilt response system to predators we have carried in our bodies for some 315 million years. But some fears aren't about the present at all, they are about the future, an anticipation of fear. My fear of ageing, of my death, of the loss of my family and other people I love: none of these have happened yet. But they can grip me nonetheless     . Sometimes anticipatory fear is the fear of a repeat of something that has happened in the past, possibly a traumatic experience, leading to the sensation of dread, that cold feeling at the pit of our stomachs.

I notice that sometimes my daydreams turn to imagining extremely distressing situations. Why do I do this? I wonder if I am rehearsing, practising experiencing this dreadful situation that I fear happening, to make it seem less bad. But when I see my clients turning over their fears in their minds, unable to sleep, unable to escape from the possibility of what might happen, it is hard to see what positive purpose this might serve.

Our fears protect us, but they can also cost us too much. Sadiq^[2] was in his 50s, an Iraqi refugee here in the UK with his wife and younger daughter. His elder daughter was 20, too old to be classed as a dependent, so could not leave with him. Massively guilty that he had left her and desperately worried about her, he explained that, though technically an adult, and safe with his brother, she was his responsibility until she was married. As a result of all this worry and fear his health and his relationship with his wife were suffering; but most of all, his relationship with his daughter was really difficult, because each time he talked to her, he would be overwhelmed by his fears and have to end the call. He was getting to the point where he couldn’t talk to her at all, or even think about her.

Feeling great compassion for him, I could see what an enormous block his fears were creating      between him and the people he loved so much. Something needed to change. We had stones and shells in the therapy room and one day I invited him to choose stones to represent himself and each family member, and lay them out in relation to each other. Watching him carefully, I could feel his worries. I chose a large shell and covered his stone with it, sharing with him how I felt his worries were blocking him off from everyone, how they made things for his daughter worse by shutting off the connection she needed with him. Silence fell. For some moments he was still, emotion tingling between us, looking at the stones and the shell. “You are right,” he said. “Can I move the shell?” As I watched, he gently pushed the shell back to make an opening towards his daughter. The connection with his daughter burst back into the room. We stopped to take in this feeling. More confidently, he moved the shell further back. Now it no longer blocked his connection with his wife. He sat back, and started to smile. “Whether I am worrying or not doesn’t make any difference does it?” The situation was still very difficult and required patience, but if he was available to support his daughter and his wife, he could manage it.

Can we live without fear? I don't believe that this is quite the right question, even though it seems so desirable. It’s a bit like hoping we might live without sadness, without grief, without anger, without shame. It is all part of the human condition. The real question is whether we can live without being controlled by fear. 

Fear can open our eyes to life. As we have seen, some fear can be motivating, energising, exciting, whether it is immediate or anticipatory fear. When I feel overwhelmed by a fear of ageing, losing control, or dying and having to say goodbye to all those I love, it can inspire me to think more about how I am living my life now. Am I living and loving as fully as I might be?   

The Tibetan Book of the Dead advises us to be ready for our death at any point. Fear of dying is a natural part of being human, and when we can embrace this fear we are more available to be alive. Yalom^[3] (2008) suggests we can manage this fear by thinking actively about our life and recognising the impacts we can have, even if not directly, but as the ripples spreading out over a pond. In Ethiopia I learnt that nothing was wholly good, or wholly bad – everything had a flip side, that, in the bright African sun, seemed either wonderful or terrible, and sometimes both at the same time. There were many difficult things, and many scary, uncomfortable experiences, but I felt incredibly alive, possibly in the way that we can do when death is close by and fully visible, rather than pushed away and avoided.

Changing our relationship to fear

If fear is ever present, and not always in our awareness, what can we do about it? For a long time I had the sense of standing by a threshold in relation to my faith, able to peek through and see the light, but being unwilling to step fully or permanently through. Actively stepping towards love, to recognising trust and safety, feels like stepping through that threshold.   

I urge you, as a first step, to look at fear, and to value it for the protection it offers you. The next step is to learn to manage it. When a radio is playing uncomfortably loudly we have a choice: we can pick it up and throw it out of the window, or we can fumble around for the volume control and turn it down. Finding ways to turn down the ‘fear control’ takes time, and we each have our own ways of doing      it. I have needed to recognise the impact my fears have on me, develop self-compassion, and become more accepting of my own vulnerability. However we seek to manage fear, there are three elements to it: a psychological element, in      how we manage our thoughts and feelings     ; a physical element, in how we calm ourselves, learn to relax, meditate and be in the moment; and a relational element, from the support and companionship we have around us.

Perspective can bring a choice. I sing in a small choir, too small to hide any deficiencies in practising, and we of course      rely on our reputation and publicity to sell tickets. We had a Christmas concert coming up, and I found myself approaching it with dread: I didn't feel we knew the music, and the concert clashed with another event in the same small Dales village, it was all going to be awful. I didn't want to go to the final rehearsal. Then I joined a contemplation session online. The theme was Mary and Joseph’s journey to Bethlehem, and we were invited to imagine what it might have been like for them, how they might have felt, how they managed to keep going. And whilst I engaged in this imaginative process, putting aside whether I believed in it or not, envisaging what Mary might have felt like, heavily pregnant, incredibly uncomfortable, wondering whether she would find somewhere safe to give birth, I found my perspective changing. As light dawned, I saw how my feelings about the choir were driven by fear, and I suddenly had the sense of a choice. A choice to view and experience the world through a ‘fear lens’, or through a ‘love lens’ characterised by love, trust and compassion. It was as if my fear had been swept away. The rehearsal was great. The concert was well-attended, and that was great. The whole thing was a wonderful, joyous experience. My catastrophising beforehand had been of little gain to anyone, least of all me. The imaginative exercise had enabled me to see things differently and given me a fresh perspective. I was surprised that such a well-worn story could have such an impact on me. 

Standing back, feeling compassion, reframing: these all give us choices. There are many ways to manage fear, through reassuring ourselves, practising breathing exercises, and talking to our friends. I practiseactively welcoming feelings of love and trust, learning the practice of contemplation, bringing my difficult feelings to God, saying “Here I am, and here are my feelings”. Whether in Meeting, in the woods or mountains, in my spare bedroom, I can offer myself as I am, and imagine God’s love and light around me.Over the last year I have had very powerful, visceral experiences of God and this makes it easier to step into that threshold, to accept, and let be, the fear that has held me back, and walk, just as I am, through and out the other side.

Possibly the most powerful support on my journey has come from the two clearness committees or deep listening circles that I am part of. Both take place via Zoom, both meet monthly, both are inspired by contemplative practice and teachings. This deeply compassionate practice has created spaces of safety and trust, within me and around me. And this in turn has enabled me to be more honest and connected within my own Meeting.

Ultimately, fear helps us survive, protects us when needed, and, at times, helps us to learn and focus on what is most important. It keeps us alive; and at the same time it encircles us in a blanket of protection that limits our capacity for life and love. As we get older, shedding fears of failure and imperfections, we can find safety, and greater      tolerance of our own failings and those of others. Coming alongside our fears, we reduce the impact they have on us; walking with them gives us the space to transform our perspective, and to be open to the passion, joy and love that life offers us. Engaging with Contemplation and my fellow travellers has shown me that I can find safety in the most surprising places, and that love, trust and courage are just there, waiting to be discovered.

[1] The Kentigern School, Sacred Space Foundation

[2] All names and details changed

[3] Yalom, I, Staring at the Sun (Piatkus, 2008).