Dominate Your Fears

Remember that fears and phobias are all products of the mind. Fear is a feeling, but your mind is the one that tells your feelings to fear something or someone.

An amuck is said to have lost his mind, which is why he has no fear of killing and being killed. Hence, in remedying your fears and phobias, you also have to “lose your mind” a bit. When you have less thoughts or imagination to play with, fears would be kept to a minimum — just enough to make you take precautions as you proceed.

The solution this book offers is not only to overcome these problems —though overcoming remedies are mentioned here now and then. The proposal is to use these reactions to your advantage and make them “user-friendly.”

Fears are parts of life. You cannot run away from your fears forever. You cannot overcome them permanently. Once you overcome them, you will have to overcome them again — and even in greater measures the next time around.

When you have grown to master your fears, they do not really disappear — they just become weakened by your powerful will and subjected to your able and expert management. Remember, you need healthy fear.

Once you become an expert at anything, it feels as if you do not need to exert any effort in doing it. When your fears have been tamed like trained dogs, they begin to be like friends. Dogs you did not train and tame will prove to be fierce enemies.

With phobias, you can do the same. A phobia is treated by repeated exposure to the stimulus (or the cause) of fear until you overcome it. See? The treatment process is really mind stimulation. It is all in the mind. By making phobias bow to you, you can even speed up the treatment. Learn to use your phobias to your advantage.

Understand that emotions and reactions (including fears and phobias) are all matters of the mind. These are often mere warnings of pain or trouble blown out of proportions. Then, they are transformed into monsters by your imagination. Imaginations can play very nasty tricks on you if you are not careful.

You must also realize that mobilizing your fears and phobias to positive use is not just about being brave. The power to rule over your fears and phobias entails a wise determination to surmount them, above anything else.