Most of us go through our lives perfectly adequately, achieving all manner of things in our daily lives, rushing hither and thither, finishing our days feeling exhausted. We are alive, we are supporting ourselves, and perhaps our families, we are successful.

However, there is another way to look at our lives; look at the things we somehow never find time for, the jobs that never get started, or perhaps abandoned part way through. Look at the calls we fail to make, the things we keep forgetting to do. It is true that in our busy lives things will get forgotten but, I suspect, if we were to review these things honestly, they all have something in common. They all are in some way fearful; they pose a threat or risk, even if it is just the threat of the unknown, or loss of control.

We probably know that other people would have no problem with getting these things done and sometimes we sidestep them by delegating them or buying in outside help. Both of these are valid strategies in terms of getting the work done, but leave unanswered and unaddressed the question of why do we fear them?

If we can just make the time and the space to be with the problem, perhaps just to consider it as a series of smaller steps, perhaps it will allow us to engage with it. It might show us which bit it is that spooks us. The advice of about how one approaches eating an elephant (one bite at a time) is hackneyed but applies too. Just being in the same space as the feared task can help dispel some of the fear. We may never be good at this thing, we may never enjoy it, but if we can learn that we needn’t fear it either; this knowledge removes so much clutter and dross from our lives.

Our minds make these barriers huge and insurmountable, but the reality is that they seldom are anything other than just another unpleasant thing. Bringing light to these shadowy realms makes our world a bigger, better place.

“I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by.”  Douglas Adams  

” I like work: it fascinates me. I can sit and look at it for hours.”  Jerome K. Jerome