Being Vulnerable To Fear
Sudheendra Chaitanya
How do we handle fear?
Avoid it because it is disturbing?
Ignore its presence by hiding,
Beneath the stock of memories?
Seek entertainment, people, God, anything,
To escape the tremor and shock of fear?
Fear strikes at us, from within.
When our capabilities are challenged;
When baffling situations,
Demand answers we don’t have;
When careful estimations,
Have gone completely awry;
When we lose control over everything,
That we tried to manoeuvre.
The past and the future are enveloped in fear.
Fear chooses to strike just at a time,
When we are not prepared for it.
When we are already hassled
By the situation at hand.
Or does fear strike knowingly,
When we are low on confidence,
And presence of mind?
Does fear realize,
The destruction that it wreaks?
Exposing the skeletons in our mind’s closets?
Why does it further trample,
Upon our efforts to regroup,
The precious pieces of an
Already scattered confidence?
Fear bares us thoroughly, when we allow it to do so.
Cutting open many a curtain within,
That remains veiled in the normal course.
Fear stalks to surprise us,
When we are dangling in trouble,
Exploiting our vulnerability.
For, that is when we are easily defeated;
Opens up everything that our personality hides,
Heightening our loss of control even more.
Fear conducts an unwarranted audit,
Takes stock of us with unnecessary honesty.
Ruthless in its task of uncovering faults,
Insensitive to the immediate call of the situation.
“What is it trying to do?”
We may cry in ailing anguish.
Fear does raise quite a few questions.
Embarrassing and uncomfortable;
Irreverent to the situation at hand!
Not allowing us to face the problem;
Rendering us unable to round things up.
Blessed is the man,
Who faces the full wrath of fear,
For he stands cleansed through every session.
He knows himself better.
Becoming more and more precise,
In his self-estimates now on.
Realizing that he is no longer invincible,
And that he is not the best in town,
That there is scope for true improvement;
Discovering the best ground,
To launch his quest for perfection.
Fear instils a vulnerable openness,
That has a different sense of assurance.
It hates any static settling,
Rips open anything that we deliberately hide.
Troubles us when we indulge in self-deceit,
Mocks our hypocrisy, constantly.
Going to the origin of fear,
One shall reach the source of existence itself,
To the beginning of all life.
Knowing oneself or knowing the world,
Both meaning the same.
Fear strikes;