Fear

by: Yasir Sulaiman

Every individual alive today is known or recognized by a distinctive personality or character that he or she shows in his or her actions and the way they speak. And there are many who have multi-faceted personalities and whose individuality changes with their mood. But a common trait that one would find in
every individual no matter how different or distant each one from the other may be is that each one has two universal halves. One half where that individual shows strength, ambition, confidence and courage to the world and the other half is the half where one’s “fear” is hidden.

No matter how much ever people deny it, everyone has fear inside them. Throughout life, they keep getting afraid of something or the other. At childhood, everyone is frightened of darkness which continues to remain in some even as they grow up. Heights always instill a fear in people, no matter what their age or profession is. No matter how experienced and brave a stuntman or sportsman you are, the fear of heights will always crawl up your neck each time you see the ground below from the top. Your mind still remains tense in imagining, someone would pounce on you while you wait in the dark. Sudden bursts of sound in silent rooms still turn people’s skin yellow.

So what do we do about this? Can we make our brave-half stronger, so that the other half diminishes? Or should we just continue to ignore it, though we know it exists inside us? No! The best way to overcome fear is to admit it’s presence within us and think of it as a weapon instead of drawback. It is because we are afraid, that we refrain from doing things that could cause harm to us. For example, it is because we are afraid to touch fire that we don't touch it and save ourselves from the injuries it could cause if we had touched it in the first place.

Any tool in the world as long as it is used in the right way for the right reason at the right time. Fear too is no different from this and “as long as fear is used to stay away from harm, there is nothing to fear.”