50 Days to No Fear!!! — Day 50, the Count Down Begins.

For many years, I’ve wanted to shine a light on all my fears and just follow each to its most horrific potential end, even those that might seem far beyond the realm of the reasonable. I want to acknowledge them, accept them, prepare for them, and forever let them go. I want to banish fear from my heart and mind, completely–forever.

At the beginning of 2021, I had a goal to make 2021 the year I banished fear. Well, I have done almost nothing to work on that goal this year, and I’ve lived with fear probably every day–fear of one thing or another. That changed today. Today I made the commitment. I made it to myself. I made it to family and friends. I announced it to the world.

I will do this. I will banish fear. I will not yield. I will overcome.

No excuses.

Bring it on.

I am indomitable.

So here we go, heart open, guts hanging out. These are my fears, as many as I can list in the next hour and a half that I’m dedicating today to just this portion of the pursuit. No particular order or degree. This is just… everything.

I’m afraid of:

• Coming to the end of my life and finding myself regretting that I didn’t give everything I had throughout my life, that I gave less than 100% somewhere. That I let fear or laziness or anything get in the way of be doing and becoming everything I could do and become.
• Bees (well, getting stung)
• Any stinging/biting creature that can inflict pain and/or do serious harm.
• Saying/writing the word penis (or any of the parts that make up male/female genitalia). Even hearing the words I get a little uncomfortable/embarrassed.
• Passing gas where anyone can smell it or hear it.
• Leaving a stinky bathroom.
• People not liking me/thinking poorly of me (there are so many things with this)
• Performing in public (drawing attention to myself in ways that open me up for more intense scrutiny)
• My facial features, my nose, face, etc…
• Having people who I want to be friends of mine or to be my significant other thinking I’m boring.
• Spending my life alone, without a companion to share in the adventures of life or joining me in my quest of making the world a better place.
• Dying.
• Physical torture.
• The possibility that I could be violent with another human being or creature.
• Having people who’s opinions of me I value think anything less of me than that I am an amazing, fabulous human being. These people could be ones I’ve known my whole life or people I’ve never even met before, just that I happen to value their opinion of me for whatever reason.
• Having people think I’m not good at something.
• Not getting to the place financially where I can support myself completely on passive income, so I can spend the rest of my life serving others.
• Having my customers think ill of me.
• Having anyone think ill of me. I guess this is a repeat. It’s a huge one for me.
• My life being short.
• My anger hurting people.
• My impatience hurting people.
• The things I’ve done and/or the things I’ve been accused of doing/being in the past coming back to reduce or halt my ability to lift the world.
• Letting people down.
• Looking awkward in some activity
• Talking to women I find to be attractive
• Meeting new people
• People not liking me and/or not wanting to be around me.
• My penis size (that’s certainly facing a fear just writing that)
• Having been wrong in my belief that there is a creator and that I’ve communicated with him.
• Having been wrong in my understanding of what I felt the creator communicated to me.
• People thinking that I am the worst things I’ve done.
• Giving a huge effort to lift the world and being ignored or looked at like “how sweet, look at the little child try” and not really being able to make a difference because people won’t care, or won’t really listen to me because I’m nobody to them, and they don’t think what I have to share/give is worth giving real time, energy, and effort to.
• Asking people for the money they owe me.
• Having my family members feel like I have an ulterior motive when I talk to them.
• Having my physical injuries hold me back from things I want to do in my life.
• Having some of the ailments I have turn out to be serious issues that hold me back and/or cause chronic pain/issues.
• Not becoming who I want to become.
• Having issues with my teeth that are expensive or embarrassing to me.
• My yellow teeth
• Having a negative interaction with someone
• Being dishonest with someone.
• Facing up to having been dishonest with someone.
• My existence as myself ending at death.
• Having hard jobs turn into nightmares where I’m just struggling to… put one wrench in front of the other and would pay the customer to just let me leave and throw up the white flag and be done.
• The work of becoming what I want to become taking so so so so so so so long because I’m just that… far away.
• Having… inconsequential things take precious time from my short life. Life. Is. So. Short!
• Needles (of any impending painful experience).
• Making poor financial choices and handcuffing myself for the future.
• Not having the perfect username on my social media profiles.
• Not having the perfect NonProfit organization name and URL.
• Having lost opportunities in the past and feeling like I might not get them again.
• Many many more things, I’m sure, that aren’t coming to mind right now…

If I were to write what I feel would be just about the worst possible experience I could imagine, it would be to be alone, with everyone in the world hating me/thinking ill of me in just about every possible way, locked away in solitary confinement, blind, deaf, and tortured continuously with no contact or communication of any kind with my captor/torturer.

Quite the interesting experience this (writing all this out for y’all to read). Yep, quite the interesting experience.

I’ve written just about everything I can think of for the moment. The funny thing is that it doesn’t take but to stand up and begin to walk somewhere or think about some thing that another fear pops in. So I’m sure there are a gazillion left I need to write, but the basic themes are certainly quite obvious and well known to me. My biggest fears all revolve around having other people think poorly of me. But I think there’s value in writing out the many ways in which my fears are manifested on a daily basis.

Well, day one challenge is in the books! I’ve made my first-draft list, and I’ve done one thing (many, actually) that scare me. And the upshot? I already feel less fearful! That’s… really cool, honestly. Really cool.

Lift the World.

~ stephen