The Journey from Fear to Love

Aaron: The most frequent question I am asked is how to work with the terrible pain which may grow from the human desire for love and acceptance, and from the fear that these will be withheld. This fear manifests in many ways-as a sense of unworthiness, as greed and clinging, as the push to achieve, as prejudice, jealousy and hatred. It even manifests as action striving to be pure service or generosity, as you attempt to be "better" than some preconceived notion of what you are, so you will be loved.

I say "preconceived notion" because very few of you know what you are. You measure the imperfections against that which you judge "acceptable" and emerge with a sense of failing utterly.

We have sometimes done an exercise where we've asked people to list those qualities they like in themselves and those they dislike. The insight people gain here is that if they are generous ninety percent of the time and greedy ten percent, they consider themselves greedy because they see that small response of greed. They won't allow themselves the label "generous." It has to be one hundred percent or I'm not that!

Do you see that in yourself? Try it with patience and impatience. Is any one of you one hundred percent patient? Yet friends might say you are a patient person. It is the discomfort of that arising sensation of impatience that leads to self-judgment, even if you are not reactive to the sensation.

You forget so quickly that within each of you is perfection. Yes! This perfection is your true nature, no matter that you cannot always manifest it in your lives. The seeds are there.

There is a lovely song I've heard that contains a verse, "Just remember in the winter, far beneath the bitter snows, lies the seed, that with the sun's love, in the spring becomes the rose." That is what YOU are, the seed of that rose, and your fear is the snow that hides the beauty from view.

For the flower, that dormant stage is a time of gathering strength, so the seed can blossom when the conditions are right for that blooming. Your fear is NOT something you need to hate, but a gift for your growth, the period of dormancy where the nurturing may occur.

In this most perfect classroom of yours, you must trust that even fear has a place. Do you know the song, "Amazing Grace"? The second verse begins, "'Twas Grace that taught my heart to fear …" What does that mean? Fear is the dimension through which you may truly learn love. There is no duality. Fear and love are a part of each other. Until you can be openheartedly present even with the heaviest of fears, you cannot fully love. Can you see that?

You've heard me talk of full telepathic communication on my plane. You receive all that another sends, and you send all that you experience and feel. Would you be comfortable with that now? Is there anything you feel a need to hide, anything from another that leads to discomfort?

To be ready to move to that plane, to grow beyond this samsaric cycle of birth and death, you must first move beyond judgment. Different religions give this process different labels, but all have in common the moving beyond ego.

Fear is a mirror reminding you of where ego is still present.

Ego is a funny thing. It's like a jack-in-the-box. It's out of sight and all but forgotten and then something pushes your button and WHOOIEE, SPROING! Can you see it up there with its silly grin and waving arms?

Can you then say to it, as a friend suggests, "Hello, ego. I've been expecting you; come in and have tea."

I've said repeatedly that there are only two basic emotions, fear and love. Fear is the closing of the heart that seeks to protect itself from pain. Love is the opening of the heart that knows its ultimate connection with all that is and therefore has no need to armor itself.

For most of your lives' experiences, you fall between the two. The heart opens, the heart shuts-again and again and again.

So what we're speaking of here is not the arising of the sensation of fear. The frequency of those occurrences will diminish as the heart learns trust. No, what I'm speaking of now is hatred of fear and reactivity to it.

What is fear? Many of you have looked with me and seen how fear masquerades as anger or wanting. What masquerades as fear?

There is within the human soul a craving, a deep desire for love. This is not good or bad, it simply is. Yet it is natural to you, for the soul has its source in Love, and all things are drawn toward their source.

No matter where its journey takes it, through whatever fear, hatred, ignorance or pain, the soul's deepest memory is of Love. That is the essence of every life form.

The soul remembers that love beyond love from the spirit plane and longs to return to that original experience of total nonseparation, the place where there is no ego or self, but only the One.

But the human is separate. It cannot be fully one with all things because it lives in a body. The fetus still within the womb dwells in oneness, but the fetal state is a transition. With birth and the physical and symbolic cutting of the umbilical cord, comes separation. You, as human, are born alone. You live alone. You leave this earth plane alone. No one can make those journeys with you.

Your deepest meditation experiences lead you to know non-separation of the spirit body, when all ego and physical awareness has dissolved. Some of you have glimpsed the bliss of moving fully into that Light of the Eternal and knowing that is your true spiritual nature, to be one with that divine Energy. But you are not only spirit while incarnate, but body and mind as well. The meditation ends. Your limbs and organs, your thoughts and emotions are there, encasing and seemingly separating this dear spirit, cutting it off from the experience of that unity it briefly knew. Then there is only memory, and a knowing that has moved closer to the conscious experience.

My dear ones, you have heard me say that this earth is your perfect schoolroom. You are incarnate in a body to learn. And yet you hate the lessons. This makes the learning terribly difficult.

How would it be if a child sat in her classroom but refused to pick up the books because they felt too heavy? Could she learn? In this classroom of life, lessons come in many forms but you turn your back on many of them because they feel too heavy.

If the experience of the illusion of separation, manifested through the body and emotions, were not necessary for your learning, you would not have it. There would be no veil of forgetting with each birth. The entire human experience would be one of conscious knowing. How would you learn faith?

Life would be a practice of self-discipline and will, which indeed it is not! This veil, this incarnative experience even with all its pains, is a gift. Can you begin to trust that, and to trust the glimpses of who you truly are?

Let us return to the experience of fear in any of its manifestations. "What do I do," you ask me, "when fear is strong?" Dear ones, no matter whether you like it or not, no matter how much you wish it away, you still continue to experience fear on occasion. Since its arising seems inevitable, can you begin to make friends with it?

IT IS NOT THE FEAR THAT IS THE PROBLEM BUT YOUR REACTION TO THE FEAR, YOUR HATRED OF THE FEAR. This hatred is what leads to the illusion of separation, and not the fear itself.

Without awareness, you lump it together, the fear itself and that which feeds off of fear. As you practice deeper mindfulness, you find you can distinguish between the two.

When fear arises and is followed immediately by the desire to be rid of it or the need to suppress it, you fragment yourselves. There is such suffering in that fragmentation. Can you take this very human person who is afraid into your arms and offer it love? Can you touch with mercy that in yourself that you have always touched with contempt?

I've said you are here to practice love and faith. Of course there are other lessons, but these are basic. Love means without conditions. Not, I'll love if you fix this or that, but love for the being just as it is-for your dear self just as you are. This does not mean you no longer aspire to grow, nor that you use your fear as excuse to harm another.

Some of you have had wonderful nurturing as children; some of you have missed that experience. I'm aware of the pain felt by those who lacked such nurturing, but there does come a time when the past needs to be put aside-not denied, just put aside. Here is this being that wants nurturing, that cries out to be accepted. Can you do it? It is as simple as that.

No more excuses about why you haven't done it, or can't. No more blaming the parents or life situations. Just this; can I open my heart to myself?

I can't tell you how to do that. For each of you, the armor is attached in a different way. You must find that key for yourself, to open the lock and remove the armor, to unsnap it, unzip it, peel it, dissolve it. But the key is always the same-love!

Every moment there is the opportunity to stretch yourselves, to go one step further than you were able to go before. Your life is a series of edges and a progression of learning, learning to let go gently and with trust. To allow yourself that letting go, there must be nurturing by yourself, of yourself. This is the end of fragmentation and the beginning of wholeness.

What keeps you from that nurturing? You say you want it, from another or from yourself, yet when the possibility for it arises, you turn away. Can you begin to see why?

You have enclosed yourselves in armor, not to shut out the light that is so beloved, but to protect the sensitive heart. It is the very vulnerability and softness of this heart that has led you to don armor in the first place. Does a rock need armor? When you pierce the tough skin of the orange, you find the sweet fruit.

I spoke before of the inherent perfection of the spirit body. This is the aspect that is fully open, loving, generous, patient, wise, and so much more. And it is so easily wounded. The thickness of the armor is proof of the beauty of the soul that lies beneath.

To nurture is to begin to open the armor. How frightening that movement is. Can you touch with mercy this dear, frightened being who wants to open and dares not? Do you see what a big step it is to admit the softness and vulnerability of that which you have spent so many lifetimes trying to make invulnerable? Yet that is your next step-to allow yourselves to become vulnerable.

And what of responsibility? As you begin to open and learn, you understand that you are, and have always been, responsible for everything that moves through you. And also, that even here you must let go of self-judgment. It feels impossible. "Am I ready to be that responsible?" you may ask. And then you berate yourselves again, for this new fear! Your lives are filled with so many "shoulds."

Can you begin to see fear in a new light, as the catalyst that reminds you to have mercy, reminds you of the sacredness and tenderness of the inner heart?

It is a constant process of awareness, watching fear arise, touching it with acceptance, watching the reactions to which fear leads-anger, greed, and such-and touching those feelings, too, with mercy. Watch each moment, in its newness. Constantly look for the pulling in of the armor. Be aware of the judgment of "I should be merciful." Can you see that's just more judgment?

As you learn not to hate your fear, a transformation begins. You begin to find healing and acceptance for this dear being that you are. Your actions and words become more skillful, not because you have said "I should" and denied anything in your experience, but because you have opened your heart to the infinite space and compassion therein.

This step is the beginning of maturity. You will not become something with no feelings, but rather, a being of intense feelings, a being of sufficient maturity, wisdom and compassion to allow the full experience of those emotions-the joy and the grief, the beauty and the ugliness, without distinction-no longer being reactive to those emotions but allowing them to serve as a reminder to love. This is the path you all walk, my dear ones, and it is a wondrous journey. Trust!