Our deepest fear

A return to love - marianne williamson

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.
Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us.
We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant,
gorgeous, talented, fabulous?
Actually, who are you not to be?

You are a child of God.
Your playing small does not serve the world.
There is nothing enlightened about shrinking
so that other people won't feel insecure around you.
We are all meant to shine, as children do.
We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us.

It is not just in some of us; it is in everyone.
And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously
give other people permission to do the same.
As we are liberated from our own fear,
our presence automatically liberates others.

..........

I really like this piece. It made a great deal of sense to me in recovering
from survival guilt. Survival guilt has a great deal to do with shame
and the sense that we "shouldn't" be happy when there are others
in the world who aren't, or friends and realtives suffering. Being unhappy
doesn't serve anyone at all. Being less than any one of us can be serves no on.
It's like trying to be lower than someone just so they don't feel bad about themselves.

I think this is what a lot of people do in codependent relationships. They feel obliged to be something less than they could be, just so that another person doesn't "feel bad". But it becomes a bizarre dance as everybody becomes less than they could be. Then they end up dumping shame on someone for being successful. Or they resent someone who "escaped" the misery.

What happens, too, is this kind of obligation to stay less that you can be gets passed between family members. Nobody dares claim the limelight, for fear of having shame dumped on them.

But ultimately it's our responsibility, I realise, to step out of this dance of fear and negativity and into a place of power. I think many people stay stuck just so they have friends. There's a negative payoff in failing, losing, or getting sick. Knowing the sympathy's there, you're not so vulnerable to attack as you would be for being successful, happy, healthy, or even positive.

And this is where the whole business of being connected to The Source is so much more important than being connected to another human being for our spiritual light and inspiration. We must recognise God, or whatever we want to call The Higher Power of which each of us is a part.

This piece was used by Nelson Mandela.