The Rouse Farm
Those of us who are raised in fear or who have chosen to live in fear come to understand, I think, that fear never completely goes away. Our ability to cope with it grows, if we work hard, and it simply diminishes in importance, existing more as background noise, or sudden flashes of terror than as something that dominates life. There is an internal element to fear – our families, the things that formed and shaped us – and an external one, life in a society that is not only but which has made fear into a highly profitable economic engine for corporate and political America – media, medicine politics, government bureaucracy, economics, weather, the law.
If you are dealing with both, as many people are, coming to terms with fear can be complex and difficult. For me, it has involved years of work – therapy, medication, analysis, meditation, homeopathic medicines, spiritual counseling, prayer, visualization, tapping and energy work, walks in the woods, nightmares, years of sleeplessness.
For me, overcoming fear almost always involves a Leap Of Faith, in fact, many. You close your eyes, and you jump. Or you don’t. Fear involves struggle and lament stories – ,my life is tough, I’ve been through a lot, I can’t run my life because I have bills to pay, and the way we process life and loss. We don’t seem to accept that all of us die, for example, so death – animals, people – seems to come as a total shock, something to lament and cling to, even when it is so integral and glorious a part of life. A friend calls me every year on the anniversary of his parent’s death, and he is very sad and anxious. I do not record the anniversaries of deaths. Being sad or fearful does not honor my parents or reflect my feelings for them. We have all kinds of rituals for fear. We are used to it. We are taught to be afraid when we get something we want, and when we don’t.
I forgot my daughter’s 30th birthday and was telling everyone I knew what I had done and how sad it felt, until one friend looked at me curiously, and said “it’s not that sad, not that big a deal. You’re just used to thinking of family as being sad.” That was a zinger, but it was true. My daughter and I are close, and neither one of us thought it was that big a deal, and looking back on it, I really don’t feel that sad about it. Sad is when a kid gets sick or somebody crashes a car or goes to war. We are taught to be sad about growing older, as if it is about diapers, discounts, handouts, pills, loss and dependence. If we dismiss this ideas as denigrating and self-prophesizing then we are dismissed as myopic Pollyannas.
When I am worried about money, I take a Leap Of Faith. I will earn what I need, get what I need. When somebody tells me I ought to go to the doctor and get tested for things, I take another Leap: doctors are not always right, their technology and prescriptions are not always healthy. I can make my own decisions.
I take a Leap Of Faith when I listen to the news or when somebody tells me in alarm that Armageddon is just around the corner, the global economy about to implode, the earth on short and borrowed time, the country on a fast track to Hell. I don’t know if these things are true or false, nor can I do much about them, other than live the best life I can and remember my history: many times have been the worst times, with the world in ruin. I take a Leap Of Faith when I am told I need a half million dollars to be secure later in life. I don’t have a half-million dollars and am unlikely to get it, and that is not my definition of growing old with grace and dignity. If our society teaches us nothing else, it is that money does not bring happiness or security, as nice as it is to have, and as much as I love it.
So here is my Leap Of Faith. I don’t tell people my struggle stories, or accept the prophets and peddles of fear. I don’t go to doctors or get tested or take pills. I like getting older. I am finally learning something of the world. I don’t listen to the news. I see that fear, like stories of sadness and struggle, are often a tradition, not a reality. Fear is getting smaller in my life every day, and all of the work was worth it. And every day, two or three times a day, I remind myself of this: I am good. I am healthy. I will have what I need. I will do what I love. I will write good stories, take good photos, share my life with my wonderful wife. That is my message, my calling.