Jeanne Marie Ketchel
Channeled by Jan Ketchel

Dear Jeanne,
I would like to continue questioning you for guidance around the subject of fear. Often, in my attempts to get beyond my fears, I simply push them away by commanding myself to: Get over it! This can work quite well as a release from being stuck, but I find that if I am not quite done with a particular issue it will return and pursue me until I look at it more closely. I will blog later about the inner process of closer examination of a particularly obstinate fear of mine, but for now I’d like to ask you, Jeanne, to address the subject. How do we know when we are done with a particular fear and that it is appropriate to push it away, rather than stay with it and do deeper work?

Inner work requires great patience. It requires an underlying desire to discover the truths of the self. It requires facing not only your fears, but everything and everybody attached to those fears. Fears are set up to allow for a process of growth to take place. This is an evolutionary purpose. In contrast, they are also set up as blockages to evolutionary growth, true challenges to your awakening spirit.

My first question to you in return, Jan, is: Are you truly ready to take the awakening journey? In asking the self this question each day you may reassert your self upon a spiritual path. I ascertain, as you know, that this spiritual path leads innerly, is reflected by life outside of you, but is mostly presented by what already exists inside of you, in your fears, your dreams, your personality, your characteristics of ego self and inner self. In order to continually confront your fears, you must continually reassert your self upon this inner spiritual journey.

Now, to return to your question regarding fear as a tool, I suggest that if you think of your fear, as I have already suggested, as your companion, you will always find your way to your inner self. Your inner self sits behind the door that your fear points out as the next one to open and venture into. What feelings and emotions do your fears present you with? How does your physical body react to your fear? What does your heart say about it? What does your inner child say about it?

When you push your fear away, when you elect to slam the door shut, walk past it, or turn and run from it, who is making that decision? Is it your knowing adult, your big baby, your evolving spirit self, or your unknowing inner child self? Who is making the decisions, and for what reasons? You may attempt to fool your self but, as you already know, that may only be a temporary thwarting of the necessary process. You may postpone your inner work, but believe me, it will return again to prod you into noticing that you are not as done with an issue as you thought.

Your mind is always ready to act on the behalf of your fear. It is always ready to trick you into complacency and comfort, into feeling inflated, into pretending that you are quite all right. In this manner it plays along with your fear, allowing it to sneak in again and find the prefect hiding place so that it may jump out and scare you again. The mind is not the place to fight your fear, but it comes in handy if you connect it to your inner process, with openness, and truthfully, so that it may empty of its usual talk and allow your heart-centered talk to fill its cavernous chambers. In letting go of the mind, in refusing to listen to the old lies and refrains, you allow your fear to lead you deeper into your other self: your psyche, and the mysteries of the inner you. In allowing your mind to work hand in hand with your fear, so that you arrive on the brink of an old place, you are offered the opportunity to once again face what is waiting beyond the brink. The brink represents your controls, the mechanisms you have previously set up to avoid facing your fears.

So, to return to your question, you must also ask your self to dismantle all of your old controls, your repetitive behaviors and habits of avoidance: your refusal, hiding, running, pretending, and even perhaps the pains and sorrows that may have become your traveling companions. In refusing to play the old games you must bear the tension of what lies beyond the door of fear and, as you stand on the brink of the darkness beyond, you must accept that you are going to step into the unknown self now, into a deeper self who has been waiting a long time for you to discover that your darkness will lead you to your light.

In facing your fears, again and again, you will discover something new about the self. You will achieve a moment of enlightenment. You will find a truth that you could not have found otherwise, and you will learn something that you need in order to advance. This is how you will know if you are done with your fears. It will only be appropriate to turn away, to push away, or to walk away from your fears when they are no longer fearful episodes, emotions, feelings, encounters, or anything that previously held you caught or blocked. Until it no longer holds any energy for you, fear will remain as your teacher. When you have learned your lesson that particular fear will no longer appear as your guide. Does this make sense?

Yes. You are saying, in effect, that to command ourselves to get over it is, in fact, rejecting our inner work. If we were done with an issue we wouldn’t be faced with the fear again to begin with, right?

Yes, you will no longer be faced with a fear if you have completed your deeper inner work around it. Of course, a new fear will appear to lead you even deeper, but you will have gained new ground, and you will be ready for this next challenge. You see, fear will always be present. It has to be, for otherwise you would not have opportunities to keep evolving.

Thank you for this guidance. It helps a lot. I am going to continue with this line of questioning in our next channeling session because more questions are arising, but I have to stop now.