Fearless

ו' אלול התשס"ח
Belz 8

If you watched the video linked in my previous entry, one idea David Icke brought out in it is the idea that the things we fear are attracted into our lives by virtue of our fear of them. Likewise, Reb Newman of Mystical Paths expresses the same idea in his post today (now Sunday in Israel), writing, "there is anecdotal evidence and books written about the phenomenon of attracting things we are afraid of into our lives."

Given that I have come upon one idea from two seemingly very different and opposite sources - one a New Age spiritual teacher and the other an Ultra-Orthodox religious teacher - I ask myself what major fears I have had during my life:

1. That I would end up stuck working in a nursing home. I greatly feared this in nursing school, and this fear indeed materialized in my life. I've worked on and off in nursing homes for as long as I've been a nurse, even working in one part time for extra money while employed full time as a research biochemist for a pharmaceutical company. Interestingly, I no longer fear working in a nursing home and actually enjoy my current job working with data - in a nursing home. In fact, I recently declined a research position and accepted the job I currently hold, in a nursing home.

2. That I would live my life without the true love of a husband. I like being alone at this point in my life. More importantly perhaps, my soul would not have developed as it has had it been tied to someone else. Being alone has provided the freedom to grow to experientially realize the true potential of my own uniqueness.

3. That I would be homeless. I've been homeless now for over a decade. Needless to say, I no longer fear it.

4. That I would be a failure or be seen as a failure. No problem here. Been there, done that many times over. I am a success at being a failure!

5. That I fit nowhere, in no community. I am a shamanic Jewitch in a coven of one. Sigh. For my friends online, who accept me as I am, I give loving thanks.

6. That I have not been a good mother. The chaos of my life has not only affected me, it has been paid for by my children and family as well. I have feared failing them more than I have feared failing the world. Today, I look at my children, my grandchildren, and my family and I see that in being a bad mother (as the world may judge me), that I have been a good mother and have taught my children the most important lesson of life - to dare to be true to themselves. This is a spiritual legacy I bequeath to my descendents.

So, these have been the big fears of my life, none of which I fear any longer. I suppose this realization fits with the "fearless" dream I had last shabbat ... The Magic Chair Of Machar Chodesh.