Physical Experiences and Fear

[Kate]

Hi all,

I don’t claim to know much at all yet about experiencing personal fear, and I have noticed confusion in myself and some others too about fear as a feeling. I’ve started realising that sometimes physical sensations occur in me and I put it down to some issue concerning my physical body, when it is actually fear beginning to arise and be exposed. Some examples would be: “I feel weak because I must be hungry and really need something to eat”, “Maybe i’m dehydrated?”, “I probably feel off because I’ve exhausted myself through physical activity”, “I must be ill and in need of medical attention”. I’m not talking about times when I can actually feel that I’m dehydrated or exhausted and need to go to sleep and so on, but there are other times when unknown, unusual, uncomfortable and painful bodily feelings arise and I am quick to put the experience down to some physical concern: “Did I eat something bad that’s causing these symptoms?”, “Is this a result of forgetting my medication?” and things of that nature. Then I focus on addressing what I believe might be the physical problem. I use this to deny awareness of my fear; I believe there is a physical cause when there’s actually an emotional one! My sense is that this list and awareness will quite likely grow as I get more experience with feeling fear.

I found it quite interesting that my disconnection from my true emotional nature (soul) is such that I often define emotions incorrectly and don’t really know much about them. I heard someone mention that they had come to realise a physical feeling they had identified as fear was actually related to anger, and that led me to question the same thing for myself. So just thought I’d share this to encourage that questioning process when it comes to defining emotions and bodily sensations.

Kate