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%FREE HONESTY RIDICULE CONDEMN EXCOMMUNICATE ACCEPT 930508

     Fear  often PARALYZES people,  making them unable  to
perceive,   understand,  decide and behave honestly and/or
wisely. PARALYZING fear is not integrative; i.e.,  it does
not lead to personal or communal integrity.  We often need
to be liberated from our PARALYZING fears of all the kinds
of realities which often engender fear; e.g., fears of:

     honesty            rejections          failures
     ridicule           condemnations       mistakes
     excommunication    judgments           imperfections
     spontaneity        letting-go          emotions
     affection          sexuality           criticisms
     exclusions         silences            secrecy
     deceptions         manipulations       coercion
     expectations       exposure            nakedness

     Some  fears are healthy fears which do not  paralyze.
Healthy  fears lead us wisely to be honest  with ourselves
and each other about risks, mistakes, tragedies, failures,
imperfections and  each of  the other above realities.  We
need to attend to,  talk about,  and make prudent  use  of
healthy  fears.  Yet we also need  to  be  liberated  from
paralyzing fears.

     We   usually  cannot  liberate  ourselves  from   our
paralyzing  fears;   for they usually paralyze us.  To  be
liberated from  our paralyzing fears we need to  offer  to
each  other  and accept from each other the gift  of  true
security  which is the freedom to be safely  vulnerable---
for  in  such true security we may safely  let go  of  our
paralyzing fears of the above kinds of realities.

     Within the contexts of  communities  which  regularly
offer all participants in the communities the gift of true
security---there is no prudent reason for justifying fears
of the above kinds of realities.  Rationalizations of such
fears can therein be recognized as  rationalizations which
are unhealthy and disintegrative; paralyzing.

     To  be liberated from our paralyzing fears we need to
find  ways  to  encourage each other stop using paralyzing
fears as hooks  by  which to manipulate  each other in our
efforts  to try to achieve what we feel we must achieve to
be secure.  So long as  we are using paralyzing  fears  as
manipulative hooks on  each  other---so  long we cannot be
free of our paralyzing fears.

     So long  as  we lack prudent courage we  cannot  stop
using paralyzing  fears  as hooks by which  to  manipulate
each other in  our  efforts to try to achieve what we feel
we  must  achieve  to  be  secure;   i.e.,   freedom  from
paralyzing fears.  Because such freedom cannot be achieved
for  ourselves  we   need  to  en-courage  each  other  by
offering to each other prudent courage through the gift of
true   security  which  is  the  freedom  to   be   safely
vulnerable.
                                                                                                                               
                         (c) 2005 by Paul A. Smith in      
                    (On Being Yourself, Whole and Healthy)  
                                                                                                                               
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