Fear

Wassup?

I appreciate all of the support and positive feedback from my blog, it is deeply appreciated, <3 - Ray

 When I was younger I remember being afraid of the thought of sleeping alone in a room, so I managed to fall asleep in my parents bed, or my sisters at any chance I could. I remember high school people pleasing to avoid conflict from friends which had me belittling myself in many situations. Neither of those behaviors fulfilled me in any way, but made me question where is it  coming from, what is the culprit? The culprit was fear.

Fear began in my life as something that seemed “normal”, excuses filled my mind and the mind of those around me as a child, maybe I was spoiled too much by my parents as a baby, so it resorted to me always wanting to be around them, maybe my sister's bed is more comfortable than mine, or me telling myself  “ what if you are going to need that same person one day if you disagree with them, you would want to stay on their good side instead of causing problems”…No.

Fear is something that halts your progress, causing you to second guess everything. It took a whole lot of prayer, and revelation for me to even see the pattern of it in my life. Fear had such a strong grip on me, it affected me in all aspects of my life. I learned recently that when the enemy sees you as a threat, he calls his bluff on you. The enemy sent fear after me because that's how he felt towards me. He feared me, or what was inside of me, which was the spirit of the Lord, a holy boldness that was yet to be tapped into, but it was strong all over me. As much as I was praying and fasting in my teenage years, I allowed fear to have me in a chokehold because it kept me in the comfortable, in a place that felt familiar to me because I have felt the shudder of fear for so long, it became soothing. It wasn't until I stepped out on faith into the uncomfortable, stepped out into the sea, where God began to show me this new world of boldness, where power and humility ran hand-in-hand, where an open rebuke is better than a love carefully concealed (Proverbs 27:5), where freedom is, where confidence is. Where I don’t care how I am perceived, I'm still going to be me.

 I often find it creeping into my life now. As I ponder on decisions I made recently, fear had its hand in a few of them, even while I was writing this post I had a fear of disappointment in the back of my mind, its crazy to think about it now, but its true. To help me with reminding myself, I write scriptures and put it on my wall for me to look at daily, 2 Timothy 1:7, “ For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of love, and power, and a sound mind”. I would recite that scripture whenever I felt fear, with prayer of course, and eventually fear became to shrink in my life, and boldness began to take its place. 

 I say all of this to say, really seek the fruits behind your intentions (Galatians 5:22), and never allow fear to try to infect any dream or aspiration that you have in your life, keep praying and having boldness. - Raylyn