Owned by fear in Scott

What I most remember as a child is being afraid. Afraid of so much. I think I learned how to be afraid and then by practicing being afraid I became very good at being afraid and that fear owned me. When I was in a psychiatric hospital as a child for anxiety disorder when the psychiatrists asked me about what I was afraid of that set me off with anxiety attacks or whatever they were. I tried to find something they wanted to hear I think because I didn’t really know. Something clicking me and I was embraced by fear and as I say it owned me. It did with me what it wanted to do except for violence. Fear will often make people violent. Make them strike out at others. Anger is a relative of fear.

Fear is something we learn. We teach ourselves and sometimes we try to force that teaching on others to make us join in some sort of fear. We see it in prejudice and bigotry. Midlife I think it was I realized I had to unlearn fear. I always feared jury duty and extremely ugly social situation to me and so many others. I still feel the dread of it. It’s hard to describe why. It’s one of those fears I need to unlearn but please Mr. postman don’t give me any jury summons. Even mentioning it I feel like I’m summoning the devil.

I’m an atheist that does not believe in heaven or hell, god or the devil. I do use the symbolism of religion at times. For example, to me being filled with fear that has no basis in reality is making a deal with the devil so that the devil does possess you. I kind of wish I’d known that as a kid since I was a very religious kid.

Many people have some sort of disability or psychiatric disorder and mine was or is to some extent still that other anxiety. I’ve studied how to take care of it to deal with it. Fortunately, with my last or most recent freak out of fear, I was able to get medication that has helped. Prozac. I wish I had had that drug at the age of seven. I truly do wish that psychology and psychiatry were as advanced back then as they are now in dealing with fear. I deal with it as it is. I see that I need to practice not being afraid and creating the illusion that fear can be. There are fears that are real that help us survive, but others that are pure, fucking stupid and useless. Those are what hold us back. What held me back. If we are suffering anxiety, it helps to understand how fear can own us, and we need to own it instead and push it off to the side with all the other illusions.