HOW TO OVERCOME FEAR

And now, in March 2020, 'the Coronavirus gives us a pause.
Perhaps it is time to remind ourselves that fear can kill as quickly as any other virus.
Fear compromises and damages our immunity and can lead to depression, which renders us inanimate and unable to fully respond to the threat.

By the way, what is fear?
Sometimes it is a slight fear, a slight apprehension, but at other times it is a violent fear experienced in the presence of danger. And this fear is nothing other than a feeling of trouble, of worry at the idea of a threatening evil.
Are we living this moment today?

How does fear help us?
These days, and for more than two years now, with the pandemic, everyone, with a few exceptions, is afraid.
And to think that before, fear came from rulers who were dictators or others, who used this strategy to control the population, but today, it is a virus.
The world is afraid to die, especially the old people who do not want to leave their homes and refuse to see anyone.

We all wonder when and how we will get out of this bewildering situation and what will be the new world we will soon face.
We have all, to date, armed ourselves with patience, fear has indeed affected many and we have almost lost the will to live.
It has affected many and we have almost lost the courage to face this misfortune
Anxiety, anguish have made normal people behave in a dishonorable way, carrying out incongruous gestures, up to this young mother who, depressed to the highest point, stabbed her two daughters of 11 and 5 years.

I think of the words of Mark Twain who said: I have already discovered fear. And it is horrible. I wish I had not discovered it, because it causes me dark moments, it spoils my happiness, it makes me tremble, shiver and shudder.
Isn't it true that we all go through a rather delicate moment when we lose the taste for everything.
What should our reaction to fear be? Where is our courage?

Can it be that fear manifests itself as anger, as anxiety when we see all around us people worried, confused, a little lost. Is it because we have not cultivated positive emotions?

We all know that fear is not a good advisor in our personal lives or in our society.

It is true that fear is a natural emotion and we are programmed to feel it. But we must be careful because Marek Halter warned us that those who run away from fear soon fall into the pit. We need to know that this fear of losing may be greater than the excitement of survival.
.
Indeed, many of us lose our lives, because as I mentioned in a previous document, the common sense of each one of us has been lost by not respecting the safety instructions.

An interesting point comes to my mind. We who live in California know that we are at risk of an earthquake at one time or another. And the latter can indeed be fatal. But it seems that this fear does not have the same effect as this Coronavirus.
Why not?
Because we are used to this idea!

The most unfortunate thing today is that this fear is presented in different ways in different models. The father who loses his job and is afraid of not meeting his payments, the student who misses classes and wonders how he will pass the class, the waitress who lives on her tips in the restaurant where she works and the restaurant is closed. The pregnant woman who has to give birth and wonders if she'll find a place in the hospital when it's full. The small shopkeeper who sees his small business going down the drain.
All these people are afraid, and with good reason.

And to think that from time immemorial, the strategy of fear has been used to control populations. This is not the case today. However, in cases like today, when the world is worried, a smile and solidarity can overcome fears.
I asked around me if people were afraid. The answer was: yes, a little, but they were confident that this crisis would end well. And here we are making comparisons as if we were in wartime, when we are afraid, even terrified, that our attitudes must change because these new circumstances require a more developed and extended role of our governments.

It would be easy to say that we must fight such apprehension, concern and worry. We need to change our attitude and to confront this looming danger, to anticipate and face a more painful future because as time approaches there are more and more victims.

I would say like Chateaubriand: everything passes everything ends in this world. He may have learned this from King Solomon who asked his jeweler to find a formula to dispel all these apprehensions.
The latter made him a ring with the inscription גם זה יעבור, this too shall pass. And when he had a problem he looked at his ring and everything was better.