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A Fear of Fear
Love is strange. I brings out the deepest secrets of our spirits, ones that we
did not even know existed - or ones we did not want to know existed. I am not talking
about the High School flings - the one week when two people decide to spend every waking
moment alone with eachother, only to realise the next weekend that there is really
nothing between them. The love I want to talk about is the constant, heart-wrenching
kind of love that I dearly hope you all get to experience some day. The love that hits
you hard in the instant you realise it exists, and that you know will not let you go
free for the rest of your life.
This kind of love is often acompanied by fear - especially if you are certain
that fear does not and cannot exist - because you know that you will never find anything
like it again if you lose it.
This fear comes as a sudden surprise to those of us who think we have managed to
face most of our fears and never suspect that another may be creeping up on us. I do not
possess the fear of losing people - I can admit now to having the fear of losing a person,
but not people. I expect to lose people. Everyone I meet, I am always certain, is going to
end up at a different school, move away, work at a different camp next summer, lose my
e-mail, misplace my phone number, start a fight that makes absolutely no sense to me...
you get the idea. The point is that at a fairly young age I beame used to the fact that
there is no point in getting close to people, because they won't likely be around for long.
On the other hand, I also have a fear of fear - which is a fear I believe most
people have. Most people, including myself, have gotten so used to hiding everything
emotional away in the deep recesses of their minds so that we are in complete control
and when we encounter emotion and fear it springs up on us unexpectedly, and we don't
know what to do with it. This causes fear and emotion in themselves to be the most
important fear they possess. It achieves this status because it has the power to convince
us not to pursue the person our hearts want - they trick us into thinking we are tricking
ourselves, which only confuses our already confused minds. If we are not careful, this fear
could cause us to lose a precious chance at happiness - a chance that doesn't seem to
come around often these days.
~Lauren, Lauren.Rizzotto@theguthan.com
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