“We Teach Our Children to Be Fearful”

We have so much fear ourselves that we are instilling fear into the minds of our children. What can we do?

We Tell Our Children “Don’t Fall”

We say to our children, “Don’t Fall; You are Going to Get Hurt; Don’t try to swim there; Don’t climb that tree; and more ways of telling our children that everything around them is dangerous. We warn them about people breaking in and robbing us, and we tell them that people are not to be trusted.

Yet studies show that those who break the rules and go out and climb trees, walk on a wooden fence, and swim where most people don’t swim are happier in general. But those who live their life in fear are never happy, they always keep the doors and windows closed in case someone might look in— and they don’t talk to the neighbors or to strangers and everyone is a stranger.

All the great avatars were not afraid of anything because fear is a concept that’s made in our mind, fear doesn’t exist in the real world for long periods of time. In nature, a hawk might see a mouse so the mouse runs away, and for that brief time, it might be in fear. But after the hawk is gone the mouse goes about its merry way feeding and enjoys life. Fear is something that we have learned to hold onto and in some strange way we have started to love our fear— because fear becomes our one true friend we can count on.

But that’s a pitiful life— always being afraid of everything. There’s no joy in life if we are always afraid. And being afraid all the time creates a cascade of deleterious hormones and chemicals that move throughout our body creating havoc. Thus sooner or later we come down with some kind of disease. Be it adrenal fatigue, shingles, GI problems such as IBS, colitis, and a whole laundry list of diseases that all stem back to being fearful.

It says in all the spiritual texts: Fear Not For I AM Always With You.

How do we break free from fear?

First of all, being mindful and catching every time we start thinking fearful thoughts. And turning that fear around with deep breathing and concentrating on the divine until we start minimizing fearful thoughts. And we start living in the here-and-now instead of moving into the past or future and creating fear.

The second way is to say the name of God over and over again to ourselves silently. The name of God is powerful and that name could be Jesus, Buddha, Krishna, or any other name of God other than just the word God. Saying that name of God over and over again brings peace and light to our mind and thus we feel calm.

The third way is to meditate daily, if we meditate for at least 30 minutes in the morning and 30 minutes in the evening then we move away from the fight or flight syndrome. Thus peace filters in and we find another way to deal with life which is full of happiness and joy.

Thus we find peace and contentment ourselves which means we teach our children to find peace and contentment.

We can change — lots of people have changed— and we can change now.

Many Blessings to Everyone!

Dr. Paul Haider