Taking on the Fire

It is normal to avoid the things you fear. After all, my fears are there to tell me what my limits are, right?  I have had that belief for years, until one particular fear nearly got the better of me. It was crunch time.

The die was cast. It was kill or be killed. So I became a killer – of my fear, that is!

Picture this: you have had a fear of fire all your life. So irrational is this fear that you only use an electric stove. You cannot stand the sight of flames, and become a zombie at the whiff of smoke. You tell yourself it’s a rational fear. Afterall, fire burns and destroys and… well, is fire.

Then one day, it comes crowding in on you. All your carefully laid out life plans to avoid fire, flames and smoke suddenly go ‘poof’. Your partner is working late one evening and you are home alone with the baby. You step out into the back garden to water the plants when you hear your three-year old child scream. You turn around to the sight of flames leaping out of your living room window.  Your house is on fire and your child is stuck indoors. There is no time to think or get help, you stand there rooted in fear but only for minute. The sound of your beloved child in danger is all you need to spring into action and you dare those flames, tear down the door, charge through the fire and yank your child out of the jaws of death.

Some time afterwards, you cannot recall how you did it but you are now standing outside the charred remains of your home holding your precious bundle in your arms as neighbours and friends commiserate with you on the loss of your home but you are not a victim tonight. Tonight, you are a lion, a conqueror, a victor. You stared your fear down, took it on and murdered it DEAD! Things can be replaced and the only thing you really feel you have lost is your fear. It died in those flames and you are set free, never to be held back by that fear again!