Tag Archives: fear and insecurity

Are You Afraid?

seagull1

 

 

Are you Afraid? Yesterday I took a long walk by the promenade. It was dusk, and the tired sun sparkled gold across the ripples of a gentle sea. The sea was basking in an orange sunset. Watching the seagulls’ gliding and soaring was mesmerising. I just stopped and let it sink deep into my heart . It brought such peace, freedom and joy to me! No video can do justice to the Beauty of their flight!

 

I was reminded of Jonathan Livingston Seagull‘s daring before challenges. His Yes to Life:

 

“You have the freedom to be yourself, your true self, here and now, and nothing can stand in your way”.”

Are You Afraid?

How diametrically different to J. Alfred Prufrock‘s neurotic cowardice, futile death-in-life and paralysing procrastination:

“…To lead you to an overwhelming question …
Oh, do not ask, “What is it?”
…
And indeed …
There will be time … for a hundred indecisions,
And for a hundred visions and revisions … which a minute will reverse.
…
Do I dare
Disturb the universe?
 … Have the strength to force the moment to its crisis?
… And in short, I was afraid.
Surely “the mermaids” will not sing to him. “… Till human voices wake us, and we drown.” “Let the dead bury their dead” (Luke 9:60)

Are You Afraid?

“But the cowardly … –they will be consigned to the fiery lake of burning sulfur. This is the second death.” (1. Revelation 21:8)
 “And there we saw the giants, the sons of Anak, which come of the giants: and we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight. (Numbers 13:13)
“How do you say Yes to everything?”
[Interview with Mother Gabrielia (1897-1992), a 20th century saintly Greek Orthodox]

Three things we need in life: first, Faith; second, Faith; third, Faith. 

“I say yes because I believe that if it is not for my good God will make it so that the No will come from the very one who invited me. …

Today I am ninety years old–may you live so long! I read again and again and again in the Gospels, and I see something strange. Jesus Christ comes and says to the Apostles, “Leave now what you have and follow Me.”

Now, if they said, “And who are you? Why should we lose what we have? Why should we lose our profit? Where will you take us? What will you do with us?”—if they had said that, what would have happened? They would have remained in darkness.

They said Yes to the Unknown who came and said, “Throw all that away!” Why? Because they believed in God, and they waited for the One who would say to them, “Come!” And that was the beginning.

Because if we say No, what will happen? . . . One or the other: If you believe, you will walk on the water like St. Peter. If you are scared–Bloop! Nothing else.

… He said to us, “Why do you worry? … Even the hairs of your head are numbered!” Why worry? Faith is lacking. May we have faith.

 

Are You Afraid?