At the beginning of the 2020s we were taken on an unplanned and involuntary journey into the future. I’ve been taking notes. Let’s get equipped.
They say that we live in the Anxious Age, which makes sense as we look around us and investigate our own inner lives. It seems like the cold hand of fear grips us all these days, trapping us in spirals of doubt and powering a growing trade in self-care essentials to cocoon our shattered minds from the onslaught. We are a people labelled, categorized and medicated. We live in a period of psychic disturbance that seems to see wave after wave of destabilizing paralysis sweep our collective mind with each pull-to-refresh of the trending tab. To label an entire era after our mental struggles seems to say more about our struggles than the era, however. Are we really asserting that the 20th century doesn't deserve to be called Anxious? Do we suppose that moderns, insulated as we are from so many of the risks and shocks of natural life, have more to fear than any previous generation? Or perhaps more pertinent, if previous generations really did not suffer from anxiety in the same way that we do, and yet confronted generational risks and daily terrors, what shield did they possess against this assault on their minds?
I think we have simply lost much of the wisdom that our fathers and mothers relied on to be "strengthened with might by [God's] Spirit in the inner man" as the apostle puts it. As a person with anxious tendencies, I have spent much of my life seeking respite from the ceaseless buzzing in my brain that insists fear is the only acceptable response to the stress of daily life. I have a hunch that the way forward won't be popular with everyone, but at least I hope you can trust that I'm taking the medicine I prescribe. As I grow in this area and look to the needs of my immediate community, I have become convinced that a single person who is able to withstand the call of anxiety is able to lead and care for many, to create oases of calm amidst the storm. You could be the shield that allows others to catch their breath and return to the fight. What is our fear for, after all?
I. Fear as the Great Focus
The common wisdom surrounding fear in our day is that it remains as an evolutionary leftover from the Neolithic, an emotional appendix that was useful to protect us from predators but is now malfunctioning and needs to be ignored or suppressed. I think we have run the experiment on pretending fear shouldn't exist anymore, and the data indicates that we are failing. There are those among us who building lives of total insulation in their homes and minds from the mental terror of the outside world, and it seems that quality morning routines and Animal Crossing don't actually solve our problem. I must emphasize that I do not say these things to mock those suffering from extreme anxiety. I also have suffered, and I am in some senses describing my own pain. But also my own healing. What if instead of a damaging atavistic impulse fear is actually a broken tool, originally designed as an emotional response to the contemplation of the Almighty? I would like to suggest that fear teaches us to prioritize what is most immensely important. It is a clarion insisting on our attention, directing us to marshal our energies and let go of our own ideas and preoccupations. Therefore, misplaced or uncontrolled fear dominates our priorities with things that should not command our attention and lies about what is really worth being afraid of. In the Garden of Eden we walked with God, and now that we tell each other He is dead we redirect our awe and dread to the ineffable but less benign immensities that weigh on our consciousness. Bathed in constant stimulus vomited from systems so massive that they seem uncontrollable and all-powerful, we have trained ourselves through constant exposure that the ticker and the body count and the breaking story wield the power of deity over our emotions. The first step to regaining control of our fear is realizing its true nature. Remember, worship and fear go together. And since humans are beings who worship, our problem is not that we fear, but what we fear.
II. I Must Not Fear
Well so far, so ethereal and impractical. How does any of this help us when we experience personal stress that feels uncontrollable and all-encompassing in the moment? Unfortunately I don't have mind-hacks for you, but I do have Christianity with a chaser of existentialism. You are going to encounter circumstances where fear tells you to let go of your primary responsibility and prioritize something lesser or something selfish. The greatest need in the Anxious Age is people who are able to recognize that this fear is a signpost, and also realize when the signpost is no longer oriented correctly. Before you are able to deal with or even stifle your fear as needed, you must understand it. What am I afraid of? What should I be afraid of? When your mind tells you that you're sitting on the couch spiraling because of the dangers of a pandemic, you can choose to either shrink away from these fears until they pass or lean into them to discover their true source. A pandemic is not a Thing, that we should fear its malice or cower at its approach. What am I afraid of? What should I be afraid of? I am afraid of death, because it takes away my control and shortens my physical existence. I should be afraid of losing my life through inaction and giving myself over to a future that probabilistically will never occur. I should fear God. Moments of actual danger teach us that clarity and immediate focus are useful byproducts of fear. If you have ever heard the pain-scream of a loved one or felt the staggering moments of a public confrontation lurching out of control, you know this feeling. Danger often produces pure undistracted priority, and this is a gift. We cannot live in a world that seeks to cushion us from negative emotion. We must be self-controlled. And to be self-controlled we must realize that we are not, properly speaking, in control at all. Fear reminds us of this constantly. Fear forces us to let go of what we cannot control and focus on the responsibilities we have been given. Our proper response to fear is to remember that there are worse things than suffering and death. Anxiety tells you that you are entering a moment of choice where you are facing high stakes. It is often an emotional misdirection from the real conflict, a distraction from the real choice. I should fear God. Those who have spent their lives fearing God tell us that the physical and spiritual experience of being in His presence is often similar to the sensation of fear. This shouldn't surprise us. The ancients often saw angelic beings that caused them intense sensations of fear, but those beings always directed the fear-worship away from themselves and to God, speaking peace as a herald of God. Fearing Ultimate Power and being met with Ultimate Love is the only remedy I have found for fearing lesser things. As you go through that experience, over and over again, you are able to say "I must not fear" and actually act on it.
III. Beacons in the Chaos
Yes I know that these thoughts are not the accepted or acceptable modern prescription for the maladies of the Anxious Age. But let's face it, the modern mind created this age. We are living in a mental prison of our own making. Perhaps a little humility and willingness to listen to those who claim to have experienced wholeness is in order for all of us. If you were weak in body, you would find someone who is strong and ask them how they built their strength. Our weakness in mind can only be overcome by the ways of living that train our mind and strengthen it, rather than reinforcing our weaknesses. Isolation focuses our mind on ourselves, narrows our world and channels our worries into a self-crushing black hole. Responsibility for others is one of the primary points of maturity that builds courage. Who is relying on you to act with calm, confidence and conviction, even when you don’t feel it? The needs of others demand our self-consciousness takes a break while we work and even risk on their behalf. Friendship and community are often the only way to determine if your anxieties are correctly aligned or if you are allowing them to focus your attention incorrectly. Good friends will gently correct you, lift your eyes to the most important things, distract you from phantom anxieties with the real joys and sorrows of life. By teaching the weakest among us to obsess over their emotions and avoid the stress surrounding decision and growth, we are handicapping them and trapping them inside a lonely world of anxiety that can only be exited by enduring pain. Just like someone with atrophied muscles, the counterintuitive way to grow is by allowing ourselves to be tested and damaged. Only then will our minds be strong enough to bear our own weight, or even more importantly to look to the suffering of others. As you take the steps necessary to realign your fears, as you accept that fear is telling you something and run towards it rather than shrink back, you will necessarily become an example to people who do not yet have this ability. How many lives could you shape, how many souls could you protect, if you allowed yourself to become resilient in the face of chaos? Often a single solid point is enough for people to rally around. A good leader brings instant calm to a situation by their presence because those struggling with panic trust the leader to be unafraid. Many of the people you know or interact with online are rapidly losing the ability to control their fear. Will you stand firm for them?
Fear and anxiety were not invented with the dawn of the smartphone and the social network. But our environment has contributed to our weakness, as if we lived in a cave and were then called upon to use our eyes in the noonday sun. As we recognize our need for steadiness, we cannot afford to be afraid of fear. It is time to recognize the opportunity for decision and clarity hidden in each anxious moment. When I run away from my family to demand a new dose of bad news from Twitter or a new hit of financial angst from Coinbase, my anxiety is not caused by news of war or adverse returns. It is caused by the realization, at the back of my mind, that I am failing to truly live as the present husband and father that I am called to be. The anxiety occurs as I realize my spiritual bankruptcy. Rather than face the possibility of not being the perfect husband and father, I would rather drown myself in an endless digital sea. Of course my pulse begins to quicken and my brain races in circles. Confronting such a disturbing fact about myself is terrifying. But denying it or hiding from it will not will it to be untrue. The only way forward is to cross the threshold and face what is on the other side. To approach God with my reality and wait for His Word on the matter. Some people will go their whole lives without taking that single step. But can you live with the masquerade of half-truths about yourself and the world, or will you throw away the crutch of anxiety and see what true fear is? What if you were made to fear, and be loved anyway?
I’ll see you in the Future.
I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain. ~ Frank Herbert, Bene Gesserit Litany Against Fear in "Dune"
Again one having the appearance of a man touched me and strengthened me. And he said, "O man greatly loved, fear not, peace be with you; be strong and of good courage." And as he spoke to me, I was strengthened and said, "Let my lord speak, for you have strengthened me." ~ Daniel 10:18-19
I have found that trust in God, with a little help from stoicism, has eliminated the fear from my life. If I declare my life complete as of this moment (finished my education, had a career and family, achieved a few goals), then whatever happens in the future is just a bonus. And having completed my life, I am free to give what's left of it to God.
"Once a Stoic begins to live 'a life that is already complete,' at that moment, he truly belongs to himself, having achieved a state of inner freedom. Rather than waiting for death to 'complete' life, a Stoic should complete life now."
"Consider how fine it is to complete your life now, before you die, and then to live out your remaining days in peace and self-sufficiency, in full possession of the happy life."
Quotes from Breakfast with Seneca (published 2022).