Fear and forgiveness

For most of my life, I was in fear. Everybody feels some anxiety about change for example, but deep rooted fear stemming from mistrust, is very likely to impact on our lives more so than healthy levels of anxiety will.

I think having an early onset of fear, comes with a "confirmation bias" effect: we overly look and find for things to be scarred off, rather than let things scare us on their own accord, as and when. Looking back at my own life, I think my paranoid illness, and the insight I lacked, was no wonder.

A fearful person puts out signals such as guarded body language, and suspicious speech, or lack of it. Some people are receptive of these messages, and they know how to capitalise from people who reveal them. It's about insight. When we realise we are scarred, and how we became so, and furthermore, that it was not our fault, especially when an early onset was involved, then we may turn that fear into anger.

However, both fear and anger directly affect ourselves. In other words, we feel them both, and they may not both be pleasant. To repeat, some degree of anxiety is useful, but it's a fine line between anxiety and the related emotion fear. John Lydon's autobiography is "Anger is an energy". Whilst anger can be positively channeled, its positive and negative are precariously apart.

Here's where forgiveness comes in, because forgiving the people that took advantage of your fear, and you ultimately felt anger towards, helps to remove it. That's the link between fear and forgiveness. With this new tack, and insight, your fear should become less automatic too.

Whilst you needn't be a Christian, or a follower of any religion at all, St Matthew reported that Jesus said how we should pray, as part of the subsequently famous Lord's Prayer. The verses are 6:9-13. The two following verses are, “If you forgive others their sins, your heavenly Father will also forgive you." 15 But if you don’t forgive others, neither will your Father forgive your sins." (CEB)

In line with my personal thoughts and interpretations, I think our heavenly Father forgiving us speaks volumes, because we are the heavenly Father! Furthermore, my words draw again from John chapter 8. Verses 31-32 read, 'Jesus said to the Jews who believed in him, “You are truly my disciples if you remain faithful to my teaching. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”'