Releasing Fearful Expectations

Fear is a natural human emotion. It rises from the primitive and instinctual embodiment that, while less and less prevalent as we grow more and more evolved and aware, nonetheless, is still present in most of us.

It's that feeling, sometimes cunning and unexpected, that clouds our vision and gnaws at our confidence. While we overcome and move past many of our fears, most of us have not yet reached a point of life where we are fully free of fears.

So we feel the feelings, and much like embracing failure, we embrace the fears. We recognize, acknowledge, and embrace. And in so doing, the fears lose some of their power over us. Fear is of the ego, a child throwing a temper tantrum. As we would love a child through those moments, so we love the fears until they quiet and lose the power of creating chaos where we would instead choose peace.

To be courageous is not to be free of fear, but to have fear and walk anyway. We embrace each mistake, each misstep, each moment of turmoil, and each thought and feeling of fear; we acknowledge, we accept, we embrace, we walk on. This really is the key to the mindset of embracing failure. No matter what happens, we walk on.

This is not to say that we ought walk into a burning building or dive from a cliff (unless you're a firefighter or a cliff diver). Some fears are valid and serve to protect us. The key is knowing the difference between a loving fear, designed to protect us, and an unloving fear, purposed to hold us back from growing and achieving.

These loving and unloving fears feel very similar. To differentiate between them requires rising above them. It's useful here to have some spiritual tools and practices which allow the quieting of, and the transcendence beyond, the lower portions of mind.

We pause, breathe deep, find peace, and from that perspective, the perspective of the higher peaceful self, look at the situation as it really is, asking “is this fear a loving fear?” or “does this fear serve to protect me or does it hold me back?”

We release also our fearful expectations. Our job is not to architect all the specific outcomes. Our job is to dream, to intend, to believe, and to walk on. Setting specific expectations on specific time lines is a recipe for disappointment – a planned resentment.

We need faith to live and walk this way – faith in the Universe, the Source, Spirit, our Higher Selves. It matters not precisely what we call or how we perceive this Higher Good. It matters only that we develop and grow a faithful trust in this Higher Good.

When we trust that the outcomes will be good, will serve our highest good, even when it's not so obvious to us in the midst of trials and difficulties, when we have this sort of trust, we can take the next step, and the next. Regardless of failures, regardless of fears, regardless of past disappointments and free of the bondage of future expectations, we walk on.

• What fears have held you back in the past?

• Are you willing to continually develop a deepening trust that all will be well so long as you take the next step?

• Do you see how your expectations can result in disappointment and doubt?

• Are you prepared to attempt to release your expectations and simply take the next step?