What are you afraid of?
When I was a little boy I was afraid of everything whether it be the dark or if it was a loud bang, it scared me. I eventually became a recluse whom would rarely leave the house but as my teenage years approached I became more daring.
Why did I come to that conclusion? I have no idea but one thing I am certain of is that it was a changing point for my life. I became more daring, I became fearless and with this fearless personality also came danger. I was not afraid to jump off of a cliff without looking, walk across a street without looking and eventually this became a dangerous personality trait.
Too much of a good thing can end up being bad, living your life in fear, expecting the worst to happen is not the right way to live your life.
Myself and another Jedi here had a discussion not so long ago about what we are really afraid of, are we afraid of failure or are we afraid of success?
We came to the conclusion that it was the latter, how I hear you cry!?
Failure is known, Success is the Unknown.
You see when you fall over, you know your knee will hurt, you know that you will need to get back up again, you know these things. Fear comes from the unknown as we do not understand it or how to handle it, so we fear the dark because of what is "in" it as we do not know what is in it.
In life we are used to failure, think how many times you failed riding a bike, writing neatly, learning how to drive? Think of how many times you failed, I bet there are a lot more times when you have failed in life than you have succeed and why is that? Because we must learn how to fall in order to get back up again.
Sometimes you end up going in a circle, you don't want to fail because it makes you feel bad about not succeeding but at the same time you are also afraid of success especially if you grow accustom to failure being the only thing that ever happens.
But success is the unknown, for instance if you were to live in a poor area and you succeeded in your life into somewhere rich and powerful, you would have come a long way with your success and it would not be the life you are used too, as we age we try less because we have grown accustom to things being the way they are, we become complacent, fearful of change and lose adaptability.
I feel like I am rambling on a bit but the point I'm trying to make is the following.
Do not fear failure, embrace it, accept it, learn from it, do not fear success, just remember where you have been and who helped you get there and show them the appreciation of the help they gave you on your journey.
- Metsu
Feel free to add your own personal reflection on the above, if you disagree say why and if you agree feel free to share a personal experience...
