Hello and welcome to episode 95 of The Ask Sri Vishwanath Show. Today is part two of overcoming your fears and phobias.
If you haven’t seen yesterday’s episode then I highly suggest you read and watch that first so you can get the maximum benefit.
We talked about fear and how we should know that every time we feel fear there is also something inside us that is fearless at that moment. Every time you experience doubt there is something inside you that is doubtless and every time you are frustrated there is something that is joyful. We are all born of this dual nature.
Channels
We spoke about the channels in our mind and how we must open a new channel and we went through the 3 steps required: the first was to be fearless even when there is no fear. We also talked about the fact that there is no self-effort or will power required to do any of this. The next step was executing it in the field of action. The final step was knowing that your consciousness is your friend and it can help you.
Fear of happening
Today we will be expanding on this because a lot of people emailed me about it asking for more information. So today I want to talk about the fear of something happening. What happens has nothing to do with the fear of something happening. We try to connect things but the truth is they are not related.
Like yesterday I spoke about how I was given medicine to keep in my front pocket as I was told I could die without it. But I will only die if it is written in my script. Not because I forgot to put a tablet in my front pocket. If something happens it is because of the script, the gunas and nothing else. We have spoken a lot about gunas and the script so I highly encourage you to read those episodes for more insight. The gunas push those thoughts to the surface and we act on them. Therefore we think events happen because of us but we are only choosing from what the gunas push up.
I want you to think of it like a film. When things happen in a film you think it is because an actor did this or that. You think his actions led him to this specific place in the film but we know that he is only doing so because of the director and because of the script that was written for the actor. No matter what he did or didn’t do the outcome still had to follow what is written in that script. So fear should never bring us to conclusions.
The gunman’s trigger
I wrote an article some time ago that received a lot of attention. It was called The Gunmen who never pulled the trigger. There was a gunman who held a gun to the back of my head constantly. He never pulled that trigger but where ever I went I could feel that gun at the back of my head. I could feel the cold metal against my skin and it made me so afraid. It followed me everywhere. I was so anxious that my palms would sweat and I couldn’t do anything. Whenever I tried to do something I would hear the gunman’s voice tell me to sit down and shut up. It never allowed me to have an opinion on anything. I spent life being mellowed down and as meek as a pussycat.
I lived with that fear and I thought that it is what it is. I thought I just had to accept it. I had never told this to anyone but one day when my son was about seven I told him about my fear. My son told me to tell him the next time this gunman showed up so he could sneak up behind him and shoot him with his toy gun. I smiled at how simple he tried to make it but at the same time something happened inside me. I wondered what it would be like to have a friend who could sneak up behind this gunman and shoot him.
Shelter
Then I thought that maybe there was a place that I could take shelter from this gunman. This is when the voice within spoke to me. Krishna says that the self indeed is a friend of the self by which the self can be subdued. The self is the foe of one unsubdued. When you subdue your fears your consciousness will become your greatest friend and ally. When you subdue your lower self it transforms into an angel. When you fail to do this it becomes the devil. This voice told me that there was something inside me that was fearless. Something that I could rely on to help me. Krishna says “fix your mind on me. Let your understanding be absorbed in me. Hence forth doubtless you shall reside in me”
I was so excited and I knew I could do it but as soon as the voice went away that fear came back and I could feel the gunman behind me once again, the metal pressed into my head. Krishna says “surrendering all works to me knowing me, Krishna paramhansa to be of all. With a concentrated mind fix your mind on me. Fixing your mind on me you will overcome all obstacles due to my divine grace.”
All you need to do is fix your mind on God and all of your problems will be dissolved because of his divine grace. That voice spoke to me but when my ego was pushed up it disappeared again. I woke in the middle of the night I woke up because I swore I had heard a gunshot somewhere. I tried to figure out where the sound had come from. Had someone died? I couldn’t find anyone. At that moment I looked inside myself and I saw a dead man holding a gun. When I looked closely I saw that his face was my face. My lower self was shot dead in the dark.
The gunman who never pulled the trigger was dead, never to bother me with his fears again.
I hope I answered your question. Remember you keep asking questions and I’ll keep answering them.