Fighting Fear

Wednesday 16th July 2014

There are times when you feel like it all matters, and it’s all you can do not to lose your mind. However, then there are times when you wonder if any of it matters, and all you can do is hope that you can be saved from such insane thoughts. In life, these two constant battles will continue to rage within you in search of balance, but you never will find peace. He knew though why he had finally found the answer and it was simple yet complicated in its own right. The answer was and always would be God.

He hadn’t understood it at first and he was happy that he had asked when he had. In the very first weeks of the Rehab program, he wondered how he would be able to finish it, and the answer he got from one of the Alumni couldn’t have been more clear. Walk into the Chapel and get on your knees whenever he felt like leaving the program. A few weeks later he had rededicated his life to the Lord Jesus, and the rest was history.

It was always interesting the contrast of restlessness he felt then compared to the joy of doing everything in Christ now. The raging storm and dead calm. The wondering about his unrequited love and love everlasting. It was almost like there was an answer for everything, and that the little things all of a sudden became enough. That they seemed to matter more, and just doing them could make him happy.

Unfortunately, he could feel the fear coming. The fear that had led him to feel nothing in the end. It was slowly building up in his gut, very liquid, thick, and dark it made him want to puke. Somehow prayer had kept it at bay, but he found it hard not to rehash the past and all his mistakes. That was the first stage of this cycle of fear and no emotion, and boy, had he a lot to regret in the little time he had been alive. Since there was nothing he could do he looked up from what he was working on and decided he might as well wait for it to begin and end again.

2017

It was too early for this, but lately, he woke up immediately the high was over. the addict was so keyed up lately he didn’t bother hiding behind the huge metal container he was smoking next to. He lied to himself it was to make sure that he could see trouble coming, but it didn’t occur to him that trouble could also see him. It also didn’t occur to him that he wasn’t paying any attention to the road but to the lit joint in his mouth like his life depended on it. So it was no surprise that what happened next almost made his soul do an unexpected exit from his body into the afterlife.

“You!” He heard someone shout. He looked up to see an old man on the dirt path, using what he thought was a walking stick, only it was the entire length of the old man’s body such that he had to hold it at the midway point just to use it. The addict discreetly dropped the joint somewhere he knew only he could find it and walked over, stepping through the dew-wet grass to the side of the path. His gait suggested he calm as a cucumber and the serious look on his face implied he didn’t know what was going on. But in the real sense, his insides were screaming against going back to the cell forever etched in his mind.

“What were you doing over there? Are you one of the thieves who have been stealing from people here?” he asked inquisitively while standing on the side of the beat-up path. The addict frowned trying to look confused. “I live just close to here so I’m afraid I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he answered calmly and evenly. “Suppose I call my friends at the police station and tell them what you were doing over there,” he tried to say threateningly. “What do you mean? I was just looking at my phone,” the addict answered fighting the urge to run away.

He had already pictured several escape routes, and he knew there was no way this sandal-wearing old man could keep up. The fact that it was early in the morning and no one hardly used this path was an added plus. However, he had blown those options out of the water when his face had been seen, and when he had told the creeper that he lived near here. The old man out of options and the unwavering look on the addict’s face instead told the addict to get out of there and that he shouldn’t see him again. They walked their separate ways without another look back.

After five minutes, the addict walked back and took the joint from under a bush near the container. He lit it and continued with his already interrupted session. Somehow that little experience had worked in his favour, and had got the addict thinking that there was a way to beat that fear. He breathed out a plume of smoke in the cold morning air and smiled. He started thinking of ways to fight the fear as his mind was taken away by the high. When he was done, he looked at the already risen sun and realized it was time to open up shop. He threw the butt of the joint on top of the container and walked toward the movie shop an idea already formulating in his mind.

Image by Ching Fong, follow them on ArtStation.