DAY 24 - CONQUERING YOUR FEARS

DAY 24

My parents immigrated to Canada at the age of 30. At the time, they had three young children. They left their family, their friends, their jobs, their house, their comfort and the warmth of the Egyptian sun to begin a new life in an unknown country. I cannot begin to imagine the courage it required to pursue this life-changing endeavor, not knowing what to expect and not knowing if they would ever go back to their homeland.

I have always admired people who show courage in their quest for a better life. It is so much easier to follow the beaten path than to craft your own way through the jungle. Fighting your fears takes time and determination. The other day, on the radio, a woman who gives swimming lessons to people who suffer from aqua phobia was saying how, when someone conquers a specific fear, the whole world opens up. After following her class, one of her students went on to climb up Mount Everest, feeling as though winning her battle with that specific fear had made her invincible.

The truth is most of us get comfortable with our fears and fall into the trap of inertia. So many projects are buried, so many dreams forgotten, so many emotions refrained, so much pleasure lost, when we refuse to face up to our fears and, as an excuse, tell ourselves our fears are just part of who we are.

The outcome of battling our fears might not always be the one we had hoped for, but it is only by making courageous choices, one by one, big or small, that we open up to the possibility of discovering beauty we would have never seen, had we taken the safer route.