dancing with fear

fear is not evil—it’s nuanced

The Dancing Maidens by Leopold Francois Kowalsky

Fear, like anger, can be an incredibly sacred teacher. A gift. An illumination. It tells us where our boundaries are, where we do not feel safe. Fear is a somatic technology of survival. The feeling that says: don’t go there, don’t touch that, don't spend time with them. That rush, the heaviness in your chest, that tightness in your throat, that wobbly feeling in your legs. While these signals can be obscure, hard to discern from the type of fear that comes from ego, from upper limits and from vestigial parts of our past selves, investing in the ability to distinguish one type of fear from the other is vital in our own process of becoming. Because listening to the sacred fear that is there to help us honour our highest self, that can help us avoid energetically dangerous situations and wisely guide us towards our own resonance, is a key aspect of living a rich, vibrant and spiritually radiant life. Honouring your sacred fear is not only worthwhile but necessary. Because as I mentioned in this tweet: you might be smarter than your instincts, but they are often wiser than you. Just because you can outsmart your fear, doesn’t mean that you should. There are times when the fear in your body knows something that your conscious mind cannot conceive of or understand. There are times when your fear is meant to be listened to instead of transcended.

Fear tells us where our boundaries are—it is there to tell us where we no longer feel safe. Sometimes that sense of danger is not real—if not physically real, then psychically real. There are *physically safe* scenarios where we do not feel psychically safe. And our sense of psychic safety is just as critical to our being as our physical sense of safety. And these signals of psychic danger can be extremely valid: not everything we perceive as dangerous is some dismissible psychic limitation that we just need to melt away with conscious awareness. Human life, while it can feel disconnected from nature at times, especially in cities doused in pavement, shielding us from the wilderness, we are still the wild creatures we once were. Our instincts are still programmed to feel into what is light vs. dark, safe vs. dangerous, and to communicate that to us with force. Our bodies are sanctuaries, temples developed over years of evolution to tell us where we might run into danger, where we should be afraid, where our body simply does not feel safe.

the demonization of fear

When we go on a journey towards our higher selves, there is this notion that is constantly being injected into our veins like an endless IV hooked up to our arm that Fear is Bad. That Fear is the Enemy: the love-blocking curse, the barrier that keeps us from all of our wildest dreams and hopes and ambitions. That we are always just one upper limit away from Enlightenment, that our fear is what’s keeping us from tasting the sweet, juicy nectar of Freedom.

But it is not so black and white. Fear is not evil. It is nuanced. Fear is there to protect us. It is an ancient piece of somatic technology trained on millennia of data—much of which has expired. The consequence of this expired data is ‘false negatives’—when we perceive something as existentially dangerous that is no longer existentially dangerous, like, say: not fitting in, being rejected by the tribe. These days you can hop on the internet and find a new tribe, maybe even the true tribe for you instead of being exiled and possibly dying from lack of resources and connection, as you might have in the past if your tribe rejected you.

But there is still the other side of fear: the side of fear that is a helpful pulse check on where we do feel like we belong and where we don’t. You won’t feel fear of ostracization in a tribe you genuinely belong in, where you match the frequency, where your being is celebrated. And you won’t feel unsafe in a setting where being who you are is encouraged! You will feel unsafe in a setting where being your raw, open, vulnerable self will get punished, made fun of, taunted, rejected, and ostracized. And, while it’s true that ignoring the fear and being as open and unguarded as possible won’t get you killed, maybe it’s okay to listen to that fear for just a moment and decide if you really want to be there. If you really want to expend the energy fielding the negativity that you will be forced to entertain if you ignore the fear just to prove you can be anyone, anywhere. Maybe there is something wise to the fear that says: take a step back, this is not your scene, not your audience. Learn, listen, observe, but don’t put your open heart on the table and watch everyone poke it with a sharp needle just to show them you can take it.

Maybe you want to integrate the sacred teachings of your fear by acknowledging that being who you are is Okay, and perhaps you do not need to flaunt every aspect of you constantly just to act against fear for the sake of it—as if such a thing is a sport. Maybe going too out of our way to act in opposition to fear is its own form of ego. Maybe learning to treat fear with the same sacredness that we treat attraction, curiosity and love is how we keep our hearts safe. We put ourselves in the right places—the places where we can be genuinely and wholly loved, and maybe that is how we find the places where we will be truly received. Because we feel a sense of resonance, and instead of spending all of our energy proving to ourselves that we can show up despite the fear, we notice its message (this place or person isn’t right for you! Go somewhere else!) and find the place where we do feel safe. Maybe we are not meant to outsmart our instincts. Maybe sometimes, fear is meant to be trusted instead of understood.

fear as unconscious wisdom

It is easy to think that fear is just another thing to dissolve, another ‘egoic manifestation to transcend.’ And often, an inhibition is exactly that: an imagined limitation that feels real in order to protect you from *potential* danger. But equally: there are many inhibitions that are there for true and real reasons that we might not be able to consciously detect—that some deeper, internal wisdom knows about. That some instinct is activating within us to protect us. And when we become too liberal with our willingness to blast past all of our inhibitions, for the sake of shedding ego, for the sake of spiritual transcendence, or for the sake of ‘purely living life from love’ we can discard some of the sacred wisdom that is trying to come alive through us.

It is easy to forget that the world we are living in is not made of pure light. Like nature, there is also darkness here, a sense of wildness coursing through each pulse of life we surround ourselves with. And to deeply, fully honour and be the steward of our own spirit, we need to pay attention to what we fear. There is wisdom in our inhibitions. There is an instinct at play much wiser than anything we can intellectually compute. And to discard it for some sense that We Know Better, that we need not ever worry about risks or fears: that they are always just invisible limitations to transcend, discard, getting in the way of our spiritual becoming is a dishonour to the sacredness of the fear and the protection it is attempting to do.

And hey—I am all for blasting through fear as much as the next girl, but I do think it is easy to wear that hat like we wear any ideology: with a little too much dogma and too little checking-in-with-self. If your body is saying no, maybe you need to listen to your body. Sometimes, dishonouring the somatic part of yourself that says no isn’t worth proving to your intellectual self that you are capable of acting against the fear. There are times when it is worthwhile to make a concerted effort to transcend the fear: when it speaks for an old pattern you want to break or a vestige of a role you are playing or an unwillingness to be seen or surrender to what feels true. Yes: lean into those fears and unmask them! Face them! Dance with them, melt into what scares you about them. But sometimes it is much deeper than that. Sometimes there is a clash in resonance at the level of our soul. And that clash needs to be investigated, held space for, honoured, treated with sacredness. With curiosity. With the same openness we extend to the parts of ourselves that shine brightly, that pull us towards the light, that immerse us in love and put us where we do feel aligned in heart and soul. We must learn to revere the protective mechanisms within us. The parts of us that say no, pull back, resist, lean away and redirect us to where we do belong. To where we do feel safe.

In the same way that we can trust the light our inner wisdom takes us towards, the leaps of faith it asks us to jump at, we should be equally reverent and curious about (and willing to trust) where it displays inhibition. Because wise inhibition often does have a texture that is very similar to egoic fear, and it does take some reflection and sitting with it to really understand where the resistance is coming from. If it is a pure-type of resistance (this feels dangerous in ways I cannot Know but I can Feel) vs. a contractive, egoic inhibition (i.e. my ego doesn’t want this but I know it is safe). These are two very different signals, but their sensations can feel similar. Which is why we need to dance with our inhibition, to court it, to get to know it, to invite it to tell us what it sees, what it feels, what it wants, what it fears. A flirtation similar to how we relate to our taste: to what pulls us towards it (instead of what pushes us away from it).

To trust our curiosity blindly is celebrated, and to listen to our fear with that same trust is demonized. But sometimes, somatic fear is something we cannot Know or Understand. It is a force greater than us, wiser than us, that we are meant to yield to at times, to understand by trusting it. By getting to know it. By dancing with it.

dancing with fear > demonizing fear

I felt compelled to write this piece because I was talking with a dear friend of mine who was telling me how she had surrendered all this resistance she was having in a relationship. Blasting past fears, willing to accept things she originally felt resistance to, and various other ways her instincts had been set aside for the sake of transcendence. But I’m not sure I believe that transcendence of fear should be placed above honouring our inner wisdom, especially in relationships, which often shows up as resistance—as fear! It concerns me that in an effort to become more ‘awake’, we can end up ignoring the embodied experience of our gut saying No. Our inner wisdom saying: this person is asking too much, willing to do too little for you, isn’t true to what they say, isn’t showing commitment. And so you feel afraid! Naturally: you feel afraid of getting hurt, of not being protected, of not being taken care of. And that fear isn’t meant to be dismissed or discarded as some egoic ‘misunderstanding’ of the situation. It is a legitimate sense of personal danger—it is a valid effort to protect you, a form of sage wisdom telling you to go somewhere else where you can shine more brightly and exist more peacefully.

Our fears are not always meant to be dismantled. Sometimes, they come from a place that speaks for something deeper than what we can understand. There are entire lineages of wisdom acting within us, stored in our bodies, from years of wise men and women who managed to keep themselves safe by trusting these instincts, who didn’t go on soul quests to disprove every ounce of inhibition they ever had.

sensitivity to negativity isn’t always a bad thing

People love to demonize neuroticism and fear. So much of what feels in-vogue in the spiritual world is to melt all our inhibitions away until we are the most raw version of ourselves, out in the world, open to anything and willing to be seen. Essentially: moving us towards a way of being we would feel inclined towards if our environment was entirely safe. But sometimes (often) the truth is that our environment is not entirely safe—which is what our inhibition exists to tell us. It says: hey, I don’t know about this guy or girl. I don’t know about being your most raw, vulnerable self in this room of people. I don’t know about opening my heart to this person that I have seen manipulate others. I don’t know about giving my gift openly and freely indefinitely. I don’t know about going places where others have warned me about. I don’t know about ignoring the gut feeling that says No.

And when we discredit inhibition, when we view that whole category of emotions as Bad, we lose access to a key component of the sacred wisdom trying to protect us. That is trying to put us in the Right places. It is a more convenient view (because it is a simpler view) to believe that every time we feel fear or inhibition, our task is to blast past it. But the nuanced take is that your fear helps you with discernment.

The world is big. The flavours of energy present within it are vast, colourful—they come in all shades and textures. The way you feel drawn towards or resistant to certain energies is your soul expressing what it desires, where it feels safest to Just Be. And if you refuse to be in the nuance of understanding the inhibitions that help you discern the best places for you to shine—the spaces where you can feel most uninhibited, most energetically free and willing to express—then you dishonour your soul’s instructions. Not every edge needs to be a teacher: sometimes fear is there to show you when a door is closed and nudge you towards a better, more inviting one—one that will open easily and welcome you warmly, instead of forcing you to break the closed one down until you’re all banged up and exhausted, just to get into a place that didn’t really want you there anyway.

And certainly: moving through fear is part of this journey. It is absolutely a key element of living from soul, because so many fears are vestigial fears — fears of rejection, of not socially belonging, of not being seen, of not being validated or approved of. And those fears we do become more free by moving through. But let us not forget the entire purpose of fear: survival. Protection. Preservation. That is its ultimate aim. And if we simply distrust anything fear has to say, discounting it as a vestige of ego, we miss certain chances to protect the sacredness of our spirit. We miss the opportunity to let our soul guide us to where it truly wants to go. To the place where it does not feel this way. Where it does not need to use all this energy to transcend the feeling. Where it can Just Be, with ease. In relationships that actually feel safe, not ones that we brainwash ourselves into thinking feel safe because we don’t want to believe we are someone who listens to our fear.

neuroticism, motherhood and protection

The maternal instinct is primal fear: fear of something bad about to happen to your baby. People love to complain about their neurotic mothers, but they are quick to forget that the same neuroticism they resent as teenagers might be what helped protect them as babies. It is often the mother’s sense of danger (which manifests as fear!) and her willingness to trust that sense that keeps you out of danger, in the glorious condition you are in today (and it is that same instinct that has kept all your ancestors safe before you). Yet we are so quick to demonize it when the shadow aspects of this quality manifest. But can we instead view a sensitivity to negativity as a gift, and learn how to integrate its edges? Can we view fear as another sacred treasure guiding us towards the places where we can be truly received?

integrating fear

We are so quick to dismiss a sensitivity to negativity in those around us as negative, unhelpful, signs of ‘high ego’ behaviour, but what if we considered for a moment that our fear—what we are afraid of—is just as important as what we are drawn to?

There is, of course, malignant fear just as there is malignant attraction. Some people, places and things we are drawn to have a sort of threatening charge to them; this sense that while we are drawn to them, maybe we shouldn’t go towards it. Like a moth to a flame with a little bit of foresight. There is a way to develop this sense with fear too — this discernment between when fear is serving a higher place vs. the type of fear that wants to hold you back, keep you where you are, keep you in your role. Sometimes that is a different fear than the one that wants to protect you, that knows and respects where you have gotten to in your practice and wants to meet you there, to keep you there. To prevent you from backsliding into a space that won’t receive you, that will hurt you, that cannot hold the thread of who you are. In that way, this is a type of fear that serves your self-actualization. A fear that isn’t evil, that isn’t trying to block your becoming. A fear that is in service of your mission, just as the curiosity we so often celebrate is. It is a fear that is integrated—a fear that is not evil, but nuanced.

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