Hope and Fear

I love to write books, but often get sidetracked by other work obligations or issues in the daily grind. Yet, I know that if I don’t write them I am rejecting what I love to do, something innate to me. In doing so, even when it gets tough and I occasionally feel fear knocking on my door, I can reject it. I hope for better tomorrows and simply love what I do.

A friend of mine recently told me that we should each reject fear and follow our hearts—because it is only in your heart that fear cannot reside.

Love has no place for fear. Yet, if you can’t channel everything into writing, how does anyone conquer fear, that angry beast that beats at our feet on a daily basis? While we fear the past, we likewise yearn for what is to be, a hope that often is unfulfilled; for hope speaks of dreams that are just that, dreams, that may or may not come into fruition.

Therefore, it is likely to deduce that fear is a residual from past events where we have endured hardship in a manner that we believe may be repeated in our present and/or our future. Hope, on the other hand, keeps us from jumping off the ledge at the thought of the return of fear by looking at a future that can be brighter.

These opposing forces are really at the two extremes of the human psyche—the ying and yang, if you will. So how do we keep from becoming addicted to one or the other—or both?

It’s easy for me to tell you and much harder for me to live by my own advice. Here’s how I see it: in order not to live in fear or in hope, you must be grounded in the present. That’s right, you have to be one-hundred-percent accounted for today. Mind, body, heart, spirit—here today and not planning for tomorrow or worrying about the past.

Just think about it. What if we all could live for today? Do you know just how productive we would be and how much love we could share in just that twenty-four hour period? Perhaps it’s just a pipe dream, but I believe we would all benefit by trying to be present today. It would help us live life more fully and would make us happier human beings as well.

Oh, and by the way, if you want to see fear and hope alive in my writing, why don’t you pick up a copy of Coming to Climax (Climax is a town, by the way). Happy reading.

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Bobbye Terry writes mystery/suspense, romance, fantasies and dystopian fiction. A Murder in Every Port, the sequel to Buried in Briny Bay, is slated for release in March. For more about Bobbye, visit her at www.BobbyeTerry-MysteryHappens.com, www.DarynCross.com and www.BobbyeTerryRomance.com.