Inspiration
Articles to inspire authentic living on the topics of resilience, spirituality, and self-growth with touches of storytelling, depth, and humor.
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“F” is for *@uck Fear!
He was mad at something, I don’t even remembered what. But my five-year-old son was having a major tantrum. And by major I mean lots of kicking, hitting and throwing stuff. I was helpless. My usual “let’s-talk-about-our-feelings-approach” was not working. I had seen tantrums before but none like those. It started happening more frequently on the following days. Of course I started reading, researching, trying different methods without significant success. Then one day I was driving back home after an appointment and I had the need to scream. Not to anyone in particular, but to the air, to the world. But I didn’t. I am a relatively put-together adult who meditates regularly and who has an obsession with processing my feelings. I don’t always have my act together, but if there has been a year who had put me to the test it has been the wonderful, unpredictable and always beating-its-previous-record 2020.
Lost in my thoughts before the light turned green I realized what was happening to me. I wanted to allow myself to do what my son had been doing for the last few weeks. I wanted to have a major Tantrum, with capital T. I wanted to throw myself on the floor and scream and cry and say I didn’t want to cooperate, that I wanted to be left alone, untouched. I wanted to ask “why” knowing that I did not care about the answers. I just wanted to be heard. I imagined myself doing exactly that. Acting like an out-of-control 5 year-old.
The beautiful mirror of my son made me see that the cause of both of our tantrums was the same: we were in FEAR. We were both like two frightened tiger cubs trying to defend ourselves and all we need us was someone to hold us tight and tell us everything was going to be fine.
The fearless rider
I am not completely sure where do I get the courage to tell the world a complete shocking fact about myself, but I guess when it became a wonderful learning opportunity for me it felt almost selfish to not share the recently acquired knowledge with others even when in the process I make a total fool of myself.
But here I go, world, as unbelievable as it is…I never learned to ride a bike.
I know, it seems like a joke that now at my recently adopted age of 43 I don’t know to do the thing that most kids learn by the time they turn…5? 8?. I never went through that rite of passage, I guess, and it is shameful and it is high up in my bucket list priorities to address.
Now that the fact is out in the open I am going to share why this became relevant during a recent short vacation. While we were spending some time in Madrid, our avid bikers friends suggested we rented electric scooters to move throughout the city. It was a beautiful crisp Autumn day, the kind that surprises you with bright sun rays and a timid cold breeze that only catches us in the shade. It seemed like a perfect plan. The only problem was that learning to ride a bike not only provides us with wonderful visions of leisure strolls through the countryside with a wicker basket hanging from the handle bars full of fresh flowers or a more modern vision of bike rentals in busy cities. Riding a back actually provides us with a very important skill that I am guessing five year-old kids might take for granted: balance.
When I was afraid
Growing up, I would dig into my parent’s extensive and varied book collection and explore everything from the Britannica Encyclopedia, to Anthony Robbins, to Kahlil Gibran. It was in one of those books, I don’t even remember which one, that I read a phrase that would become my motto. I remember the moment of revelation it was to read it, how some kind on spiritual and intellectual door opened and changed me forever. Paraphrasing, it said that the only thing we should be afraid of is fear itself. That moment I decided to leave fearlessly.
I faltered a lot, though. The raising criminality in the place I used to call home and some close encounters to what could have been extreme tragedy made me powerless. Other than, I have tried to leave a courageous life.
Today, I had to face fear itself in a very unexpected location: the gym. I attended a very fun Zumba class. I was doing my turns and my steps while grinning bluntly. Then I felt it. First time it happened was five and a half years ago and it was back, was it? I was sliding to the right and my leg seemed to have turned more than it should, and something pulled behind my knee. I moved again and there it was. I stepped down for a second thinking I should stop and rest.