Words don't scare me. But ideas do.
An idea can destroy kingdoms.
An idea can demoralize nations.
An idea can take root in your soul and poison it until there is nothing left but cold desire and a thirst for something that never was and can never be.
Fear is an extremely potent sort of idea.
The idea that if the worst could happen, it may happen and it will happen. The idea that everything is hopeless, inevetable. Without cause or reason.
Fear says it cannot be overcome. It tells you it cannot be quenched. It tells you it is a virus. Well a virus is like getting a cold.
Yes, that's right. You can protect against it, get flu shots. You can spritz your hands with sanitizer, clean the doorknobs, isolate yourself from coworkers and friends. Yet sometimes even then it will find you. It can catch you unawares.
Then what do you do? If you have a cold you deal with it accordingly. You rest. You drink water. You rest some more.
And the cold doesn't go away, but you manage. Even a particularly persistent cold never lasts forever.
Fear can paralyze. Fear can sting. Fear can poison. But fear cannot kill.
Fear cannot cause you pain. But it is a type of pain. So don't fear what fear can do. Do not fear whatever it is you fear.
Pain is not the worst thing that can happen to you. Because there is beauty there. The greatest poets, athletes, geniuses, works of art have a depth to their joy that comes from the pain they've been put through.
So whether or not you fear has very little do to do with what will happen. And what will happen has little to do with whether or not you fear.
