My Fear Story

I'm thinking if you're a fearful Christian and have wandered your way onto this new blog, what you probably want is some comfort, understanding, and encouragement.  You want to know you're not alone.  So, I think I'll tell you a little bit about myself and my fear story.

We're all born with our personalities, right?  I am an artistic, introspective type.  And I think I always had a greater propensity for fear and timidity than many other folks.  Some of us are just like that.  My mom used to tell me I was so shy as a little girl that I'd hide behind her legs when someone new was around.  I have distinct memories of being really uncomfortable with some people, decent people I realize now, but they were new and therefore scary to me.

My little life went on as all of ours do, and bumps and hurts happened.  Some were of the ordinary variety and some of a larger sort.  I think my fear capacity began to enlarge pretty much right away.  Trying to ice skate on my own at 3 or 4 years old and landing flat on my forehead on the hard ice was one of the first events that taught me to be afraid of trying things.  The normal getting hurt by older brothers, falling down the stairs...such things worked their way into my fear prone heart.  Life went on and bigger knocks happened.  Some I can only partially remember.  Which probably means they're pretty significant.

You know, when we're growing up, we don't know anything.  We don't know how this life is supposed to work.  If we get hurt, we don't know how to deal with it.  We don't have the tools to work through such things in a healthy way on our own.  If our parents aren't there to help us process through some pain or wound in life, we don't have a clue what to do with it.  And reality is such that even the best parents can't be with you for every experience that might need working through. So when we're on our own we do the best our little minds and hearts can come up with.  For me, I went inside myself, didn't tell anyone what hurt me and kept all my pains hidden.  With each passing year, my heart became more guarded and less accessible, even to myself. 

So, add together a fear prone personality, life's painful events, and not having a clue how to properly deal with those hurts. What do you get? A little girl growing up to be driven by fear.

Early on in my childhood, I began to have nightmares and had such exaggerated fear at night that I often ended up in my parents' bed.  I hated the night.  I hated being alone in my room.  It took me forever to fall asleep and the worst was knowing eventually that I was the only one still awake.  I felt so unprotected and unsafe.   I couldn't have put those words to it then; all I knew was that I was afraid.  If I would wake up in the middle of the night, I would get so afraid that I would eventually end up hightailing it down the hall and then slowly creeping in between my parents in their bed.  It's embarrassing to admit that this wasn't just my behavior as a 6 year old.  No, it happened well beyond the understandable time for such things. 

As I grew into my teen and college years, I thought I'd gotten a pretty good handle on fear.  I didn't seem to be troubled by any out-of-the-ordinary fears.  I didn't see that I had built a stone wall and a mote around my heart in an effort to self protect - which was clearly an act of fear and remains today one of my biggest issues.  (I need to keep reading and re-reading Bo's Cafe!)

My adulthood fears have shown themselves in surprising ways.  Though I am not troubled by some things that others are afraid of, my saying for several years was:  "You name it, I'm afraid of it!"  I've learned that my first reaction to most things is fear.

We'd been married a year and we wanted to stop renting and buy a house.  I wanted a house of our own.  But I was scared.  

I absolutely love dogs.  "Hey, now that we have a house, let's get a dog!"  I was scared.

Ever since I was a teenager I've wanted to live in the country.  My husband, too.  Nine years into our life together, we started to pursue that dream.  I was scared.

See?  I'm even afraid of the very things I totally and utterly want!  What's up with that?!  I'm learning to give these first reaction type of fears no credence.  If not immediately then eventually.

OK...well, I'm running out of steam tonight.  I just wanted to open up and share a little bit about my fear story with you all.  So you can know that I'm right there with you, and so you can know that my heart is with you.  In this blog, I'll be sharing some of the things I've learned about fear and how it affects me and others around me.  I also want to share lots of scripture because it is God's word to us meant for encouragement, strength and hope.