“The only thing we have to fear is fear itself – nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyses needed efforts to convert retreat into advance.” – Franklin D. Roosevelt.
Fear grips your whole being and then paralyses you. It destroys you from the inside out.
It stops you dead in your tracks. You cannot think clearly and can only focus on dealing with the immediate perceived “threat” — fight or flight. It is terrifying to lose control and be in a prolonged period of anxiety.
I have never been so frightened and caught in the grip of fear as when we first moved to Canberra in 2014. My job hunting turned out to be a nightmare. There were some interviews, a few short-term part-time jobs but nothing meaningful or permanent that I could survive on. The days slowly stretched into weeks and then months.
I went through my first year in a new country without full-time work and I was terrified. It felt like I had tried everything and more and as each week passed by I was slowly eating away my savings.
It would take me a good 16 months before I would land my first real job. Many thoughts passed through my mind during this time.
How do I pay my rent? How do I pay for my groceries? How do I survive without money and hope? Why had I failed so miserably to provide for my family? I felt like a failure.
The intense and drawn out period of waiting for more than a year and feeling like I was all alone made it worse. It was a hard and dark time for both my wife and myself. I was too scared to tell her how I felt but I think she could see it in my eyes.
Never have I felt so defeated and afraid. What I learnt from that experience is now embedded deep in my mind.
Fear can destroy you only if you let it.
“The only thing we have to fear is fear itself— nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyses” so don’t let it stop you.
Keep moving forward, one step at a time, one day at a time. You can do it. Keep the faith and believe in yourself. What you have within you is greater than anything fear can throw at you.
A man is not defeated by his opponents but by himself ―Jan Christiaan Smut.
Exodus 