{"id":1227,"date":"2021-01-27T09:13:03","date_gmt":"2021-01-27T17:13:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.luterra.com\/blog\/?p=1227"},"modified":"2021-01-27T09:13:05","modified_gmt":"2021-01-27T17:13:05","slug":"letting-go-of-fear","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.luterra.com\/blog\/?p=1227","title":{"rendered":"Letting Go of Fear"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Toward a More Equal America, Part 12<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Fear
 False Evidence Appearing Real
 That which we believe keeps us safe
 Makes the world far more dangerous
 While keeping us small
 Keeping us miserable
 Diminishing our confidence
 Diminishing our power.
 \u00a0
 Fear controls us
 So that we wish for control
 And when we wish for control
 Those who wish to be in control
 Have their wish granted.
 \u00a0
 Fear occupies a strange place
 In our collective psyche
 Not revered
 Yet not questioned
 We might view it as harmful
 Yet we do very little
 To speak against it.
 \u00a0
 We chastise those who incite violence
 Or who incite hatred
 While those who incite fear
 Spread their fright-words far and wide
 From Twitter accounts
 And news hours
 And halls of Congress
 To nary a peep of dismay.
 \u00a0
 If we are going to have a chance
 To rebuild trust in each other
 Trust in democracy
 We are going to have to do something about fear.
 \u00a0
 This doesn\u2019t mean pathologizing it
 Judging those who are frightened
 Or anxious or stressed
 There is no shame
 In being afraid.

 At the same time
 It is high time
 That we recognized
 That fear is bad for us
 Like cholesterol or corn syrup.
 \u00a0
 Fear is both addictive and harmful
 A psychological nicotine
 That can be added to ads
 Stuffed into stories
 Ramping up ratings
 And inspiring us to buy
 What we do not need.
 \u00a0
 Contrary to popular opinion
 We do not need fear
 To keep us safe.
 \u00a0
 We do not need to fear a virus
 To make choices 
 That will prevent it from spreading
 But if we fear it
 Then we will fear each other
 And our fear will tear us apart.
 \u00a0
 We do not need to fear death
 For there is nothing that we can do
 That will grant us immortality
 And so our fear
 Can only diminish our experience of life
 In our days in the sun.
 \u00a0
 Politics has become infused with fear
 On both sides
 And so we seek to control and destroy
 Bringing ourselves ever closer
 To the fascism and socialism we fear
 Those being two sides of the same coin
 The Nazis were socialists, after all.
 \u00a0
 Driving ourselves closer to a loss of democracy
 Dividing families and communities
 Straining the fabric of society
 So that even fires and floods 
 No longer bring us together.
 \u00a0
 It is time for us to recognize
 That this fear does not serve us
 That it will not help us to accomplish our goals
 That it will not bring us closer
 To the equitable society that we seek.
 \u00a0
 In fact, it seems quite clear to me
 That this fear is intended to divide us
 That this is not just about sales and ratings
 But about keeping us small
 Keeping us divided
 Keeping us from rising up
 And demanding our democracy back
 From those who seek only wealth and power.
 \u00a0
 So, I say
 I am done with fear
 Will you join me?
 Will you accept that I do not wish to harm you
 Even if we disagree?
 Will you accept
 That this world is big enough
 For all of us?
 \u00a0
 Can we begin instead to rebuild trust
 Starting local, bridging divides
 And breaking free
 From this two-headed political monster
 That seems determined to steamroll our humanity
 Beneath the wheels of the corporate wealth machine?
 \u00a0
 Can we begin to elect those 
 Who are simply citizens
 Who are not career politicians
 Beholden to moneyed interests?
 \u00a0
 Can we tell the Davos crowd
 That we don\u2019t appreciate their meddling
 Their meetings and schemings
 To design a future
 In which they feature prominently
 And we are controlled and pacified?
 \u00a0
 We inhabit a representative democracy
 A constitutional republic
 So we need not change the laws
 Or stage a revolution.
 \u00a0
 We need only slough off the fear
 Escape from the narrative matrix
 Reclaim our voice
 And choose only those
 Who speak with that voice
 To represent us.
 \u00a0
 It is time to see where we are headed
 A world in which we sacrifice liberty for safety
 And in the end have neither
 A world that Democrats and Republicans alike
 Are leading us toward.
 \u00a0
 It is time to build a government of, for, and by the people
 With an economy of, for, and by the people
 With liberty, equality, and justice for all
 We cannot do that if we are afraid
 Of each other, of death, of climate change
 Of ourselves.
 \u00a0
 If we are to build a better world
 We must choose love
 And let go of fear.
 \u00a0
 Let us begin. <\/pre>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Toward a More Equal America, Part 12 Fear False Evidence Appearing Real That which we believe keeps us safe Makes the world far more dangerous While keeping us small Keeping us miserable Diminishing our confidence Diminishing our power. \u00a0 Fear … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.luterra.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1227"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.luterra.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.luterra.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.luterra.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.luterra.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1227"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.luterra.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1227\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1238,"href":"https:\/\/www.luterra.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1227\/revisions\/1238"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.luterra.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1227"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.luterra.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1227"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.luterra.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1227"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}