Fear is Like Adrenaline

Fear is like adrenaline:  it gives a burst of energy but will not sustain anything.

I had one of those moments yesterday:  the sudden onset of the end of the world, the increased worriedness, the sense of my time suddenly having to be used to accomplish things now, now, NOW!

So immediately I tried to pick up the pace of what I did:  using my time more "wisely", trying to focus purely on work, making plans for using my other time to the point of being able to dedicate more to my employ.  Plans, plans, plans.  Panic, panic, panic.

It managed to hold itself up almost to this morning where, like a sack that is only partially filled, it sagged to the ground spilling out its contents.  I just sat there looking at them, trying to figure out a way to stuff them all back in and carry on.  Suddenly, I found I had no energy (and perhaps no emotion) to do that anymore.

The odd thing (to me, I guess) is that so much of what we do and what we live in is bounded by fear.  In some cases, fear seems to be the preferred environment created by some for reasons that I don't think I would be able to understand - at best, one could say that it creates a certain sort of "motivation", which it does - just not a very sustaining one.

But the only thing more difficult than reacting from fear is to not react from fear.  It takes far more courage and a far stronger will, because one is making the conscious choice to slow down and act decidedly and decisively.  It also takes the ability to push back on others - people or things - that create and thrive on this environment of fear.

It's hard - but the alternative is worse. One can only take this slight edge of panic constantly for so long.