In Search of the Miraculous
“…A man usually has many unnecessary, imaginary fears. Lies and fears—this is the atmosphere in which an ordinary man lives. Just as the conquest of lying is individual, so also is the conquest of fear. Every man has fears of his own which are peculiar to him alone. These fears must first be found and then destroyed. —Chapter 11
Views from the Real World
Very often a man…does not realize how big a role fears play in his life. He is afraid of everything… afraid of the children of his neighbor, the porter in the entrance hall, the man selling newspapers around the corner, the cab-driver, the shop assistant, a friend he sees in the street and tries to pass unobtrusively so as not to be noticed. And in their turn the children… the hall porter, and so on, are afraid of him. —Essentuki, 1917 – Fears — Identification
This Fundamental Quest, Henriette Lannes
(H)uman beings…for the most part…react…to surrounding conditions. The strongest of all these reactions and the basis for many others seems to be fear, the inevitable result of human ignorance. Nothing is more uncertain, more full of danger than our existence on this planet, which cannot but end in death, the greatest unknown.
One may well feel that a blind need for security lies at the origin of many of our most dangerous psychological traits— possessiveness, egotism, the struggle for supremacy giving rise to oppression, and so on. Fear has also often given rise to the grouping of human beings into different communities, castes, and classes. Whence the need for leaders and all sorts of power possessors. —Influences – A Influences
The Fourth Way, P.D. Ouspensky
…You must understand that many things you ascribe to things outside you are really in you. Take for instance fear. Fear is independent of things. If you are in a state of fear, you can be afraid of an ashtray… You are afraid, and then you choose what to be afraid of. This fact makes it possible to struggle with these things, because they are in you.
…We often invent objects for an emotion when the emotion is already there. Take envy, fear, suspicion. We think the emotion is produced in us by something outside, when in reality it is in us, we only look for an object afterwards, and in this way we justify it.
…If you observe yourself, you will see Causes outside remain the same, but sometimes they produce negative emotion in you, sometimes not. Why? Because real causes are in you, there are only apparent causes outside. If you are in a good state, if you are remembering yourself, if you are not identifying, then nothing that happens outside (relatively speaking, for I do not mean catastrophes) can produce a negative emotion in you. If you are in a bad state, identified, immersed in imagination, then everything just a little unpleasant will produce a violent emotion. It is a question of observation.
Reality of Being
In facing life, I am driven by the force of my ordinary “I,” whose very possibility of existing depends on the world that surrounds it. This “I” has a deep fear of being nothing and is afraid of not having security, power, possessions. …There is almost constant fear— not a particular but a general fear— of being insecure or incapable, or some other vulnerability. And there is always avidity. [Note: avidity comes from (Fr)“avidité” = eager, greedy. I want to obtain, I want to change, I want to become…
…My wish to know my feelings must be stronger, without either excusing or rejecting them. My thought has to be keen and precise in order to be free from their effect, and my attention must not weaken or deviate if I am to see their meaning and the extent of their influence on my life. I need, at the very moment, to be able to open to the intelligence of silence, in which alone understanding could appear… —#33. I blindly trust my feelings
…Indeed, so long as our total consciousness has not been liberated from fear, we will not be able to go very far, to penetrate deeply in ourselves. By its very nature fear is inevitably opposed to our entire search. But what is the basis for fear in us? Does fear as such really exist? Have we ever experienced it as a reality in itself and not simply the feeling that precedes or follows an event? When we are truly face-to-face with the event—for example, with danger—are we afraid? In fact, fear only arises at the moment the thinking fixes on the past or the future. If our attention is in the active present, to think of yesterday or of tomorrow is simply inattention, an inattention that engenders fear. When we give our total attention to the present, when we are wholly present, fear does not exist. We see that we do not know, that we cannot respond. In this state of complete uncertainty, we can discover that which is true. If we wish to penetrate deeply in ourselves and see what is here and even beyond, we must have no fear of any kind, not of failure or of suffering, and above all not fear of death.
We have never, with our whole being, inquired what death is. It is always considered in terms of survival, …But this survival is only the survival of what is known. In fact, our lives are a continuity of the known. We act from the known to the known. …We do not see that it is merely a hollow projection of the thought, that it comes from the imagined “I” created by our identifications—my family, my home, my work achievements. When we realize this clearly, we can approach the question of continuity without sentimentality and without our usual ambition to affirm ourselves…
In order to understand itself, the mind has to be completely still, without illusion. …There is no time, only the present moment. …At each moment one dies, one lives, one loves, one is. Free of fear and illusion, moment after moment we die to the known in order to enter the unknown. —#74. Free of fear and illusion
Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism, Chögyam Trungpa
Fear comes from uncertainty. ,,, Uncertainty is related to distrust in yourself, …There is no fear if you really have a compassionate relationship with yourself…. —The Open Way
Compassion contains fundamental fearlessness, …marked by tremendous generosity, …This “generous fearlessness” is the fundamental nature of compassion and transcends the animal instinct of ego. Ego would like to establish its territory, whereas compassion is completely open and welcoming. It is a gesture of generosity which excludes no one. —Prajna and Compassion