Fear

Fear; what a deceiving word. Fear is something that you feel during so many aspects of life. Rather it be a fear or something so small like spiders, or something so silly like going on your first date, or something so big like not knowing if you are going to see tomorrow. Well let me tell you a little something about fear. Fear has four sides. On one side of fear there is hope, on another side there is love, on the third side there is freedom, and on the final side there is faith.

 

I feel like the last little while I have been living in fear. Fear of losing friends, fear of loving, fear of failing, fear of being hurt. And I really have shy'd away from so many things because of it. I get really down on myself a lot more than one should. I have always been a person with very high goals, expectations and standards and this past year I feel like I have failed myself for not doing as well as I wanted in that class, or letting something really good slip away. But then I would get scared, and I would have fear. I wouldn't want to take hard classes or try and figure things out between people, all because I was scared. Which in my opinion is normal. But I let myself be consumed with fear. I became really sad, I was lonely-even though I really wasn't and I just felt sorry for myself all the time. I had the attitude of, I will never find that again, I will never amount to anything, why should I even try anymore. But then one day I was in relief society and a beautiful sister stood up and talked about her trials with The Lord. This sister certainly has not had it easy, she has had multiple serious health problems and for awhile she thought she was not going to make it. But then she said something that just made me really think. She talked about how if she lived in fear of not knowing if she was going to be able to wake up tomorrow and not knowing if she would be able to continue to see her family grow, then she really probably wouldn't. But she looked at the four sides of fear. She knew if she loved, had faith, and hope, then she could have the freedom from fear.

This has really been on my mind a lot lately. Because of an event that has happened in my past, but certain events that have simultaneously kept occurring I have lived in fear. Fear of being hurt by a person that I care for more that I ever thought I would. Because it has happened before. Multiple times. And even after all that pain, I still care and love this person. Maybe not to the extent that I had in the past, and that is because of fear. But I can't keep letting this fear get in the way. It is very difficult to talk to people and tell them your emotions about certain things, about anything, but I know that if we do it with the four things that surround fear we will be much happier. We will be free of something that has been holding us back and we will be able to continue living our lives how we are supposed too. I don't know what I would do with out this gospel in my life, it just keeps leading me in more and more good directions and I am forever grateful. I am so grateful for my friends that I talk to everyday and keep me going, giving me encouragement, and making me laugh, and I am especially thankful for my family. This is the time of year for us to be thankful so I am sure there will be some more of those posts coming up soon!! I hope everyone is having a great week! Tomorrow is Friday!! Hallelujah! Thanks for reading!

-Nessa