Some light on the state of fear

Fear is the danger--for example, when I was a little girl, my leg was healed of a nasty, painful boil. I had worn a wool stocking to hide the boil from my mother who was busy with our large family. When the removal of the stocking revealed a huge scar, she was surprised by what she saw, and scolded me because of the danger I supposedly had been in. The motherly concern took on in my own thoughts imaginative shapes, and I became fearful.

Even though the boil was visibly gone, the pain returned. But then I asked myself, "Why are you afraid? You are alright. Your leg is fine."

As I accepted this simple truth, the fear immediately vanished, and I felt at ease again.

In the Bible, the wisdom book of Job, sheds some light on the state of fear.  Job said, "...the thing I greatly feared is come unto me." (3:25).  Isn't he saying that the fear of a dreaded thing makes us suffer what we fear?

Spotting fear as a false thought with unreasonable emotions should alert us to fear's deceptiveness.

But it can be difficult to do.

Eva-Maria Hogrefe 

2018

Obonato" in their language means: "I exist because we exist."

The anthropologist invited the children from the African tribe to play one game.  He placed a basket of fruit near the tree and announced, addressing the children: "The one of you who reaches the tree first will be rewarded with all sweet fruits."  When he signaled to the children to start the race, they locked their hands tightly and ran together, and then they all sat together and enjoyed the delicious fruit.

  The astonished anthropologist asked the children why they all ran together, because each of them could enjoy the fruit for himself.  To which the children replied: "Obonato—Is it possible for one to be happy if everyone else is sad?” "Obonato" in their language means: "I exist because we exist."

Love this!!🥰

EMH, her photos

 

On Making Mistakes

On Making Mistakes

“ The sages do not consider that making no mistakes is a blessing. They believe, rather, that the great virtue of man lies in his ability to correct his mistakes and continually to make a new man of himself.”

Wang Yang-Ming, Chinese philosopher and statesman of the 15th century

We had the experience...

“We had the experience, but missed the meaning. 

T.S. Eliot 

At a meeting of medical and surgical specialists years ago, the following remarks were made:

“Anyone who thinks because he or she is getting along in years they must have loss of vigor, debilities, or that degenerative disorders should be experienced, is suffering from a ‘time neurosis’ which may be more effective than physical conditions in producing the effects they fear.

Every human tissue is endowed with potential immortality when adequately provided with food factors, oxygen and suitable warmth, and when removal of waste is carefully affected.  Time has no effect on human tissues maintained under these condition, or indeed, under any conditions. Vigor does not necessarily vary with the age of the adult. Belief in the effect of time tends to reduce ambitions, and  therefore expectations and endeavors curtailed.

All those who develop a time-neurosis submit to the prevalent superstition that time is in  some way a poison excerpting a mysterious cumulative action. The obsession itself may be the cause of dying prematurely. Senility, they say, is a neurotic condition.”

“ Time is not Toxic” quoted from the NY Herald Tribune