Fear

The Greek word  Phobos *which is where we get the word Phobia today* means "fear" or "terror" and was also the name of the Greek god who is a representation of fear in Greek mythology, Phobos was known for accompanying Ares the god of war into battle along with the ancient goddess Enyo, the goddess of war and strife, the goddess of discord Eris, and his twin brother Deimos. the god of dread and terror. 

Fear.  In today's world they tell you to be afraid of EVERYTHING this food causes cancer, this food makes you fat, you'll die if you don't do this everyday, you could die in a car, you'll definitely die on a plane, terrorists are everywhere.  The list of things to fear goes on and on, books are filled with phobias.  Fear stands in the way of so much, of so many.  Recently Cassie a blogger that I've recently started to follow wrote A very interesting post and it got me to really start thinking. 

What am I REALLY afraid of?  Do those fears stand in the way of me living a really authentic, and amazing life?  The life that God wants for me?  What are these fears?  Why do I have them? What can I do to eradicate these fears?

I felt inspired to make a list *like I always do* of the fears that worry me the most, the ones that so often occupy my mind, and my heart.  One of my fears actually intertwined with my blog and this post.  So that is when I decided to do a blogging series on fear.  I know there will always be things that I'm afraid of but there are some that I can definitely do something about.  So I'll be showing my list of fears here and then this upcoming week I'll go into more detail about each one, and how I plan on overcoming them or just coming to terms with them. *I will also be very honest in these posts and hope that people are kind enough to keep negative opinions and judgements to themselves*

Now I'm not a huge Yoda fan *he kind of creeps me out* but he made an excellent point.

"Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger.  Anger leads to hate.  Hate leads to suffering"

 I don't think you could ever get anything more true than this from a weird little Jedi, fighter, troll dude.  The stuff about the dark side notwithstanding, Yoda makes an awesome point.  Fear Does lead to anger, anger Does lead to hate, and any negative emotions like hate will Always lead to suffering.  If i look back at the times I've lashed out at people at the very root of it, it was almost always because I was scared of something.   
Bet you never knew star wars got so deep did ya?


So here is the list of the fears, worries, and anxieties that keep me up at night. The ones that make my mind go crazy.  And the ones that stop me from living the life that God wants me to.

1. Driving
2. Being honest about my body
3. The end of the world
4. My brothers & Parents
5. Something happening to my marriage
6. losing someone else
7. my inability to follow through