facing fear

I find myself not wanting to go to sleep tonight afraid of what bad thing might happens next. I don't know if this is usual in my situation, but it challenges me to face my fear and to find ways of conquering it. When facing this fear - it is the loss of control in life - which for most of us really is an illusion. We like to think we are in control - but we really aren't - it is just the thinnest of delusions.

Now, I am not here to tear down those things that get us through everyday life - what ever they are - rather for me I find I have to face it and find away around it or through so that I am not afraid - the words of the 23 Psalm come to me "Lo, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, thou art with me" and this phrase comforts me because I do feel like I am walking through this valley. I can't go around it, find an alternate route or take a detour, I have to walk through it. But I also find that facing my fear is a challenge to me - that I do have another of acting and thinking about life where fear doesn't control me. Now most of you know that I am not christian, so I don't turn to traditional religious expression - at least I don't think of christian teaching as having taught me, even with my Masters of Divinty, to live in the moment - to live in the here and now - in the present - if I am correct I have gotten that teaching from Buddhism.

Now I am not saying I don't believe in the power of prayer and that I don't draw some hope and solice from different religious traditions - among them the teachings of Jesus and some of the great words of the Old Testament - but for me to face my fears - I am finding that refocusing my energy and my thoughts on the present - since that is all we really have right now - this very moment - helps dispell my fears and allows me to keeping going day to day. If I call on Buddhist teaching and images of the Goddess, the 23rd Psalm, and opening my soul to Winter - to fill me with hope - then I choose to use those tools to dispel the fear and to keep me positive from one moment to the next.

My fears are those things that might happen and can't control - But in this moment I can dispel that fear by not focusing or dwelling on the might happen - on a future of what ifs - I can choose to focus on this moment and let meself dwell in the moment - sink into it with revelery - and see its quiet power and not be afraid.....