My fear of the dark continued but as I got older, I developed this fear that monsters were on the carpet. They couldn't get me as long as I was on my bed. My foot could not hang out of the bed otherwise they would get me. If I needed the loo in the middle of the night, I would run and use the biggest stride length that I could so that my feet touched the floor as few times as possible in case the monsters grabbed me by the ankle. I never wanted to go back to bed because I would have to do the whole thing in reverse but include a leap on to the bed and tuck myself in as fast as was physically possible.
As an adult, my fear of the dark seems quite ridiculous. Whilst my adult perspective is great for childhood fears, with adulthood comes adult sized problems and adult sized fears.
We had a guest preacher at church today who told us the story of an elderly lady whom he knew when he was a curate. She never accepted a lift home after helping out at events. One day he finally asked her why she didn't accept a lift and asked her if she was scared when walking home. Her reply was "of course I'm scared, but I would never be able to do anything if I didn't face my fears". She didn't want to give in to that fear because she knew that life would be so much worse if she stayed at home all the time becoming evermore fearful of the big, bad world. The preacher's point was that we should not let our fears stop us from doing what we are supposed to do, what we are called to do.
This really made me think. What am I afraid of? What fears are holding me back?
"We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark; the real tragedy of life is when men are afraid of the light" Plato
I think Plato had a point. Sometimes I wonder if children are afraid of the dark because they can sense that evil lurks there. I'm just about to start reading for an essay that has to explore the symbolism of light and dark in John's gospel. For as long as I can remember, darkness has been a Bad Thing. But, as Plato said, it is a real tragedy when what we are afraid of is the light. For me, light is synonymous with Jesus and goodness. Whilst following Jesus can be comforting, I often find that this happens:
Jesus seems to be very skilled at directing me out of my comfort zone. But, I wouldn't be showing much faith if all I ever did was stay in my comfort zone. I have this theory that whenever I'm doing something that God has asked me to do, I know that it's one of those things because I find it equally terrifying and exhilarating. Maybe that's just me. I love theme parks and rock climbing for the same reason. When I'm at theme parks or rock climbing, I put my trust in the safety equipment. It's the same principle with following Jesus. I put my trust in Him.
But I'm not convinced that faith is the opposite of fear. Love is. I don't trust my own faith when I'm praying over big decisions. I trust that God loves me. I can either be paralyzed by fear or I can choose to trust that God loves me and follow Him.
I'm still pondering what fears I might be holding on to. If I'm honest, I'm not sure that I want to work it out because then I'll have to face those fears and trust that God REALLY loves me. I haven't quite worked out yet why I'm a bit fearful of totally trusting an inherently good God. Maybe it's because I'm a control freak? Maybe that's the fear that I need to let go of?
In other news, I managed to write my essay and hand it in on time. I have no idea how I managed that one. I wrote a 2500 word essay in one day. I'm not expecting to get a good mark but at least I managed to submit it on time despite the horrors of the bug and the ambulance trip.
The meditation experiment is going better than expected. Having changed my 'anchor word' (apparently this is the Christian meditation name for a mantra) to 'Jesus', I am finding that I enjoy some of the stillness and not-doing. I still find reading my Bible to be more grounding/comforting/Spiritually connecting but I quite like being able to meditate just to prove that I can shut up when I want to.
You also need to know that I am now deeply worried about my subconscious. I had a dream. Let's just say that it involved a cheeky talking dinosaur called Bert. Bert liked to eat semi rotten food and ran off to find some mushrooms. I'm not sure why I chased after him to try and look after him given that he was more work than all five kids put together. He liked to have cuddles and was particularly jealous of the baby. My brain must have been feeling deeply traumatised to have dreamed that one up. I think that it was a cry for help. Or chocolate. Probably chocolate...
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