Write about fear
The 500 Words
There are so many of my fears that I could write about:
heights, flying, getting hurt (physically and in matters of the hearts), dying,
etc. So, how to choose which one to write about today? Well, considering I’m
working on overcoming my fear of heights that is what I will talk about.
I’m terrified of heights; the weird part is that it isn’t
even ridiculously high heights, it’s the heights that are just high enough for
me to know that if I fall, I will get severely injured. If it’s super high, it doesn’t
bother me as much because I just assume that if I fall, I will die anyway.
I was told once that people who are afraid of heights and
flying have control issues; I think that is an understatement for my
personality. Seriously though, what if I fall and die? I’ve decided that no
matter what, I will die eventually, so I just need to learn to roll with it.
Anyway, yesterday I went rock rappelling with a new friend,
and I got to practice my efforts to not be afraid of heights. I began going
down the rock, giving myself little slack so that I could have more control. It
took forever. I made it to a little rock ledge and made the mistake of thinking
I was more than halfway to the bottom, and I looked down.
The ground was SO far away, and I immediately froze. My fear
suddenly consumed me; my legs were shaking and I began involuntarily
whimpering. I clutched the rock for dear life and tried to take some deep
breaths. After a minute or two, I realized that I couldn’t go back to the top,
I had to keep going if I wanted to get out of this situation. I had to face my fear.
So there I was, trapped on a ledge, and completely
terrified.
“You can do this. Come on, pull it together!” I declared as
I slowly began heading down. As I slowly but surely made my way down the rock,
I realized that looking straight down wasn’t a good idea, but looking ahead for
the next step was absolutely okay. Perhaps this is the Universe’s way of
telling me that instead of looking so far ahead, I should simply try and
anticipate my next step.
I literally inched my way down until after what felt like
forever and a day, I made it to solid ground again.
As I unstrapped my harness, I looked up at the rock, and
asked my friend, “Did I really do that?”
Yes, I did.
I was so proud of myself for not letting my fear prevent me
from moving forward, when I could just as easily have refused to move (although
it wouldn’t have done me much good, now would it?). Sure, today I am incredibly
sore and still a tad shaky, but the sheer awesomeness of knowing that I
overcame something like that is pretty neat.
All right me!
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