Here's the thing about fear.
It is thinking about future bad scenarios. If I think
about future bad scenarios, I will experience them as though they are actually
happening. Consequently I will feel bad now, as though the thing in the future
is already occurring now.
There is a purpose to thinking about future bad
scenarios, namely, planning whether I am going to take any defensive,
preventative, or evasive action.
Once I have analysed the future scenario sufficiently in
order to be able to devise my defensive, preventative, or evasive action, there
is no further purpose in living in the future.
If I say I have lots of fear, that means I have been
deliberately living in the future. There is not a lot of point in complaining
about something I'm doing to myself. My question, therefore, is why, when
temptation to fear arises, I do not turn to God and deliberately think positive
thoughts and consider constructive action.
I must be getting something out of it, and enjoying it in
some way.
I have had to learn not to be a victim of fear and to take responsibility for my own
thoughts and therefore my own emotional life.
In a bad situation, my job is to invoke the power of God,
by visualising future scenarios and affirming that God will help me through
them.
An example is this: sometimes I get a little worried
about the future, and specifically my finances. What I can do is say this: 'I
trust that, whatever happens, God will look after me. I trust that God will
always find ways of making me useful and that, if I stay useful, the world will
give me enough for me to survive and have a decent life. I believe this because
I have seen this occur universally around me in AA. God, let me dispel these
irrational fears and remember that I can always be OK holding Your hand in the
moment'.
I have to make sure that no negative word passes my mouth
and that I'm relentlessly cheerful and positive with everyone I meet. I don't
always manage, but that is the ideal.
A question to someone who's had a bad day is this, 'have
you let negative thoughts rest in your mind, and have you said anything
negative or done anything that is not constructive?'
It is no good running to God saying 'help me, help me,
help me', when I am running around expressing negative sentiments and doing
unhelpful things.
God will do for me what I cannot do for myself, but he
will not sew up my mouth or bind my hands to prevent me from saying or doing
things I shouldn't say or do.
God will also not say my prayers for me. A childish
prayer is one in which I ask God to save me and wait like a bird straining its
neck for the worm. An adult prayer is one in which I affirm, over and over,
that I have already been saved by God, and that the illusions in my head do not
reflect reality.
There are surely difficult situations and there is surely
pain in life. All of what I have said above is not to dismiss either of those
two facts.
The question when things are difficult is how I am
responding to them and whether I am using the tools that have been given to me.
Last year, a very close relative suffered a stroke.
Naturally, there was some fear and trepidation. But I refused to dwell on
either and focused instead on how I was going to invoke God's power to concentrate
on what I could do practically about the difficult situation. I endeavoured to
remain cheerful, useful, and kind whatever happened, and thereby was able to
contribute to the person's recovery. God surely helped me, but I had to start
by helping myself.