Matthew 10:28

For years I have suffered from anxiety. It is debilitating. I have spoken before of the recommendation of therapists that people who are depressed or suffer from anxiety are not supposed to listen to or read news or listen to evangelists; both accentuate the negative.

Since the events of September 11th, I have had a short circuit in my ability to deal with anxiety. I have talked about it in therapy. I have blogged it.

In actuality, my anxiety was made worse by the events of 9-11; it was actually born in my childhood because of my grandfather-the predator. I am always "on-guard" and had always been "on-guard" since I was about four years old. It is difficult to live in fear.

I watched coverage of Coretta Scott King's funeral. During the coverage, it was reported that Martin Luther King, Jr. Heard about JFK's assassination and turned to his wife and said, "That is going to happen to me." She looked at him and said, "I know."

They knew. They knew and yet kept going. They kept marching and peacefully protesting even though they knew that someone had him in their sights. After her husband was assassinated, Coretta Scott King said, "I will not live in fear." Then she went to Memphis to march with the sanitation workers.

Wouldn't we have understood, as President Clinton stated, if she hunkered down with her children and went about a quiet life after her husband was assassinated? Yes. We would have understood. Yet she didn't. She continued the fight...The march...The dream. She kept going. Not only to honor her husband, but to continue to pursue a better life for all races.

It is funny that I had to go back to reading the news to connect all of the dots. I "get it" now. I had been immersing myself in fear. I was actually trying to find out the worst case scenario so I would know what I needed to do to prepare for a terrorist attack or a pandemic or a fight like that which occurred on Flight 93 on Septemtber 11th.

I felt that I needed to know what could happen and in looking into all of the possibilities, I scared myself half to death....Almost literally. Now I realize that nothing in my life has changed. Some day we will all die-we cannot predict it or prepare for it. It will just happen-No matter what I do to prepare. We are after all mortal.

This has been a long and difficult journey for me. Little Big Boy was born six months after the World Trade Center was destroyed. At the time I wondered why we were bringing another life into being; it all felt so scary and frightful. But now I realize that the chance of death has always been there. I just forgot that. It was there before September 11th, too.

I have allowed myself to be immersed in the fear. Coretta Scott King was brave and her children were brave to carry on their father's message all these years...Knowing that someone could raise a gun to them, too. They defied the shooter(s) and thus thwarted the assassination. In spite of the assassination, the civil rights movement moved forth...Undaunted. That is what I wasn't able to see any more. I should just continue on toward the dream...The dream that hatred will be abolished...Right?

So now I can get back to living. Now I understand what it all is about.

Matthew 10:28

Do not fear those who can kill the body, but cannot kill the soul; rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell.