There is a Zen story that depicts a very real dilemma that we all face. Often in our efforts to avoid pain, we do all the things that cause the very thing we fear to become reality. In the story, a man is walking in his garden in the morning when he comes face to face with death. Death says to him “I’m coming for you tonight.” The man panics and calls for his horse and rides as fast as he can to a distant city. That evening, walking in the garden, he meets death. When he shows surprise, death says “I told you I was coming for you tonight, but you left before I could tell you where I would be.”
In our efforts to avoid our worst fears, we all too often do everything that will bring them to pass. In an effort to avoid being alone, we make bad choices, hurt others in an effort to protect ourselves, and in general continue to create a dysfunctional situation, which only perpetuates our worst fears. Addicts, in an effort to avoid pain and loneliness drink and use drugs. They wind up losing relationships, jobs, custody of children, homes and all income. One day they look around and wonder how “did it come to this?” Facing our deepest fears requires courage and standing still. If we run, if we try to manipulate our circumstances, we are guaranteed of failure. The woman who fears that her husband will stray and cheat on her becomes overbearing, controlling, whining, and demanding, as she tries to keep him close to her, and one day she looks up and sees that all of it has only driven him away and he has found someone new. What a surprise!
It is worth noting that the thing we fear has already happened. If we fear being alone, it is because at some time in our lives we have been alone, abandoned and uncared for. The pain and humiliation of rejection is unbearable, but we never connect our discomfort and our dysfunction in relationship with the pain we suffered as a child, or even as an infant. What is hidden from our eyes continues to drive us and control us!