Embracing Fear: How to Turn What Scares Us into Our Greatest Gift

225 Pages·2005·0.61 MB·English

by  Thom Rutledge

EMBRACING
FEAR
How to Turn What Scares Us
into Our Greatest Gift
THOM RUTLEDGE
In loving and grateful memory of
Charles Leon Smith, Jr.
1918-2001
and
Antoinette McDonald Smith
1919-2001
real-life heroes and
authentic role models
of genuine courage
If I refuse to listen to the voice of fear,
would the voice of courage whisper in my ear?
—JANA STANFIELD, Brave Faith

Contents
Foreword vii
Epigraph iii
ONE Don’t Run, Don’t Hide: The Power of Fear 1
TWO Stepping Up: The Meaning of “No Fear” 21
THREE Walking Kirby to Class: Facing Big Fear 37
FOUR Making a Run for It: Getting to Fear 53
FIVE Why Me? Why Not Me?: The Question of Deserving 73
SIX Encore, Encore: Life’s Recurring Themes 91
SEVEN Unique Just Like Everyone Else: What We Have in
Common 109
EIGHT Up Against the Wall: When It’s Time to Challenge
Fear 133
NINE The Push: Leaning into the Fear 149
TEN Signing Up: Realities of Roads Less Traveled 165
ELEVEN Beyond the Wall: Living the Courageous Life 185
Thom’s Nutshells 201
Acknowledgments 205
About the Author
Cover
Copyright
About the Publisher

Foreword
WHEN MY BOOK The Gift of Fear was first published, some
people recoiled from the title. “Fear’s not a gift I want!”
people told me. Really? You don’t want to receive nature’s
brilliant survival signal, the signal most likely to warn you
of danger?
Similarly, some may recoil from Thom Rutledge’s concept
of embracing fear. This feeling we run from, this emotion
that controls so many people, can be, as this book makes
clear, our most effective and protective ally—but first we
have to know what it is, and what it isn’t.
We confuse true fear with unwarranted fear, mixing them
up with anxiety, worry, and dread as if they’re all the same.
So to define our terms:
• True fear is a signal in the presence of danger. It is al-
ways based upon something we perceive, something
in our environment or our circumstance.
• Unwarranted fear is always based upon our memory
or our imagination.
vii
viii / Embracing Fear
In day-to-day life, you can quickly tell the difference
between the two. Imagine, for example, you’re about to
board a flight and you’re suddenly overtaken with dread
and uncertainty about the pilot’s ability to fly the plane. If
that dread is based on a plane crash you saw on the news
three weeks ago, it is unwarranted fear. If the fear is based
upon seeing the pilot stumble out of the airport bar, it’s the
real thing.
True fear is the messenger that intuition sends when the
situation is urgent, and it’s not easily quieted. If you want
it to leave you alone, whatever questions it poses must be
answered. Thom helps us find those answers. He’s a funny,
compassionate teacher whose class could be called Fear
101—or more intelligently I suppose, Embracing Fear.
Thom shows us the power we gain when we stand up to
fear—and the bullies who deliver it. Governments have
embraced fear, but in a much different way than Thom
suggests. Throughout history governments have used fear
as the perfect method for persuading (and often bullying)
populations to accept actions they might otherwise resist.
All governments on earth want their citizens to believe that
only the government can protect them, and they know this
works best if they generate fears that are new and improved.
The old fears just don’t get our attention as well.
The fear du jour for both the government and the news
media, as if you need a reminder, is terrorism—but it’s al-
ways something. It’s as if there’s a space in our collective
mind reserved for things that frighten us, and that space
must be kept occupied. If we are not fearing terrorism, it’s
mad cow disease, or killer bees, or gas-tank fires, or danger-
ous tires. Before September 11, we feared enemies within:
AIDS, asbestos, the vengeful coworker, the local serial