Daily writing prompt

What fears have you overcome and how?

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I just came across this quote whilst scrolling Instagram this morning, “Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one’s courage”, by Anais Nin. Ummm okay so if that’s the case my life should feel huge. Other than mice, I can’t really say that I have or have had any tangible fears. Definitely not heights, or large bodies of water or snakes or spiders. Not a huge fan of flying but I do it in order to take vacations. I refuse to overcome my fear of mice, I don’t want to think about them or talk about them.

During my twenty-three years as a nurse, there were plenty of times that I had to stare death in the face, in the patients I was caring for. Death is certainly frightening and I wonder if there are people in the world who’ve never pondered it. That would be pretty cool. It’s something that I have probably spent too much time thinking about. Because it does happen, it will happen. It’s just a matter of when. Then again it’s a complete oxymoron to live life always pondering death. What a waste of time. Possibly precious time.

I felt at certain stages in my life, death was extremely frightening. For example, as a new mom, when my kids were babies. Sometimes (and I’ve learned this is just my anxiety) I would worry about having something sudden happen, like a brain aneurysm. So morbid. But my brain did go there.

Thankfully, in my forties I wizened up to the fact that I may actually not know everything and I started reading self improvement books. Authors like Jay Shetty, Mark Manson and Eckhart Tolle helped me sort of figure out in brain what was important and what wasn’t. Their books made me realize I am in charge of what I think, I really am. Though death can be scary, I don’t dwell on it. I try to stay in the now.

I think it was that my brain tried to look down the railway tracks of my life to see what was up ahead and prepare for it so it could be comforted by knowing what was coming. Just as I always used to read the ending of books before I started them. I had to know what was coming, I wanted no surprises. But I found out that it was just my anxiety. I couldn’t handle the not knowing. Today I am okay with uncertainty, at least much better than before. I’m always a work in progress it seems.