Fear is a primal emotion with survival value. It has served to preserve life and limb in all of evolutionary history. And each of us has encountered fear in every stage of life - fear of the monster under the bed, fear of failure, fear of ostracism, of childbirth, of something bad about to happen to you or your loved ones — and of course, fear of death.

Benefits acknowledged and duly mentioned, we can look at the level of fear in the general population, its manifestations and consequences, to what is generating fear nowadays and whether it is an emotion that can slow one’s growth in consciousness, and do we need to mitigate it somehow?

 

As a doctor, I have watched the level of anxiety climb astronomically, in older people, in middle aged people, and especially in young people. The culture surrounding us is changing rapidly. Thinking about my childhood, I grew up with my mother doing the wash by hand, cooking every meal from scratch. No TV till I was ten - we would read and listen to the radio! But I always felt secure. My mother was home with me all the time. My father came home every night, drank rarely and never to excess, and never shared his worries with me. Today kids of the middle class (if there is still such a thing) are worried about their “online image”, about their gender assignment, and whether there will be a school shooting in their school today. Hiding under a desk to protect yourself from a nuclear attack has given way to active shooter drills that all to often are soon tested with an actual attack. Families are as likely to break up as they are to stay together, and abuse of the vulnerable is rampant. Even if it isn’t in your family, you are affected by the ambient energies and beliefs. Kids are exposed to everything under the sun on a tiny screen that has no morals. No wonder people are anxious and in fear!

 

Our moral standards have been eroded by those who should be pillars of decency. When is the last time you heard the phrase “my fellow Americans”, rather than more divisive, derisive and degraded comments?

 

So the cultural foundations of our values are crumbling. Fear is the result.

 

I propose here a few places to find the antidote. Like every malady, the underlying cause must be rooted out for each individual. What I propose here is some remedies, - from simple to more challenging - that you might find helpful in determining your own sources of fear, and being able to do something about it.

 

Some of the underlying correctable causes of ungrounded (not related to a current threat) chronic fear and anxiety: 

Trauma in the past that has left an imprint but is not imminent

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Some of the best therapies are talking to a good therapist, EMDR, body work, meditation, yoga, psychedelics. Pick one.

 

Hormone treatment, especially for midlife anxiety or sleep issues - bioidentical progesterone is available in low dose topical creams from any good health food store. It does not require a prescription in the doses available OTC. Women can hugely relieve their anxiety - no Xanax required - with a dab or two of progesterone every day. No need to fear cancer, this is the natural hormone, not an invention of the Pharma industry, - the real instigator of cancer in the infamous Women’s Health Initiative was the “progestins”. Yam or soy extracts provide the chemical starting point for the topical progesterone but the end product is chemically the same as human progesterone. Other hormones can balance the brain and body, but progesterone is the premier calming hormone for the brain, as well as improving bone density. Good place to start.

 

Inflammation in the brain is likely to cause anxiety, also irritability, confusion, brain fog, cognitive dysfunction, and many psychiatric conditions. This often comes from inflammatory foods - hyper processed, nutritionally depleted food-like substances that usually come in a box or a bag or a can. The antidote is whole foods grown organically (without toxic chemicals).

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Another big cause of brain inflammation is inflammation in the gut. A distorted microbiome directly affects the body’s ability to make serotonin, among other beneficial substances. Of course, the underlying cause is the same, - a poor diet laced with poisons.

 

Toxins are everywhere, including the blood of newborn babies. Microplastics circulate in our blood, lodge in our brains, and join the pesticides, herbicides, plastic additives already there, To avoid all those chemicals is not possible on the Earth at this time. The milk of Laplanders contains mercury, though their teeth do not. We can make the best choices in food, in cosmetics, in furniture and paints, etc., and still have exposure. There are protocols for detoxification - sweating, chelation, taking binders, -that can help. Doing them on a rotating basis throughout the year is a very good idea and may help with anxiety.

 

Toxic ideas also pervade our zeitgeist. But the antidote to propaganda is psychedelics, said one pundit (possibly Terence McKenna?). But fear almost always gets in the way. People fear losing control, of losing their minds, indeed - of losing their lives -to a psychedelic experience. The very thing that could help them shed the chains of fear seems the scariest thing in the world, and many will refuse. Fear of death cannot survive the direct perception of our immortality as a soul.

 

My goal in presenting this material is to challenge you, the reader, to open your mind to the possibility of healing through a glimpse of the infinite. Personal trauma dissolves in the face of eternity. Beliefs that limit us and prevent our growth in consciousness are suddenly seen to be false and outdated. Truisms we imbibed in childhood and have never questioned, come up for review.

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Why sit in your seat of fear one moment longer? Why not take the challenge, take the leap, and see what all the fuss is about?

 

Constrained by fear, the human being is less than she could be. Walk through fear and find it is only an idea, not a real threat, and find your fierceness, your uniqueness and your destiny.