No Fear

Yesterday, I had a conversation with a friend where I found myself insisting that I have no fear.  She was doubting me and perhaps I protested too much.  Our silly banter made me ponder that concept a little more because I really don’t experience fear.  But why don’t I?  Then I was reminded how my children never seemed to express fear in the years following coming home with me.  They took big physical and relational risks, broke all rules, and seemed to be unmoved by my ire.  I came to know this as traumatic dissociation, because the longer I lived with them the more I saw how much fear and anxiety operated in them.  They were actually afraid of almost everything.

fearMy children and I have something in common.  We have all three been scared “to death” in our lives and survived to see another day.  That kind of trauma can have varying impacts on people.  Some become more fearful and others repress fear completely, thus NO FEAR (or any other feeling for that matter.)

Eventually, the feelings of fear must be uncovered, so life can be engaged with appropriate amounts of risk taking and caution. I think my children have work to do in this arena.  When my daughter calls in tears about how scared she is to be on her own, I hear the grief and work to soothe her.  My son still glazes over to avoid his fears.  There is more processing to be done for them to emerge feeling safe inside themselves and in the world.


So, what is my story.  Of course I feel fear, when I am in danger.  Since I am rarely in danger, I rarely feel fear.  I was scared to death early in my life and I think I did repress my feelings for a number of years.  In my twenties I faced my scary loss with copious crying that seemed to last forever. Talk about keeping my therapist flush with vacations for a few years. When the grief came to a natural close–my loss processed fully, made sense of, and incorporated into my narrative about myself–I returned to a life fully alive and filled with love.  That was my goal then and continues to be my goal now. I think living in love, without fear, AKA anxiety, is the outcome of doing my personal work.  I am grateful for that and for the ability to embrace life and accept it on its own terms.  For me, there is no other option.

unconditional love

Felt safety needs to be our parenting goal for our children, so they can face forward without fear and with love in their own lives.

Love Matters,
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Ce Eshelman, LMFT 
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