Fear: The Other “F” Word

Today's blog is by special guest blogger, Mike Berkson, one of the two stars in the stage performance of Handicap This! which is coming to Owensboro, KY on Thursday, September 20 at the Riverpark Center. After his birth, the doctor told Mike's parents that Mike would never speak, walk or think like a normal child. By age three, Mike spoke more words than his "able-bodied" twin brother. Mike shares that he and his mom returned to that doctor, "and at her instruction, I said to him: 'Quit your day job.'" Enjoy!

Your eyes dilate. Your pulse quickens. Your mouth becomes dry. Your hands begin to tremble. Your body is in complete panic mode all because you are afraid.
Have you ever seen a high-wire tightrope act? I always marvel at their ability to dazzle us with their physical agility and strength. Not only are they so high up, but they look graceful and confident while doing it. It seems physically impossible! How do they do it? Let’s face it, most people at some point are going to trip just walking down the street.

There is a family known as “The Flying Wallendas.” For generations this family has been performing death-defying acts that boggle the mind, astound the eyes, and make us spontaneously break out into a cold sweat. They have looked fear in the face and they have said, “No, I am not going to let this emotion affect something that I love to do.”

Most people are paralyzed by fear. That is what fear does. It stops us in our tracks. Fear sets up a road block that we don’t think we will ever be able to get through. Some members of “The Flying Wallendas” have perished doing what they love, yet they all still live their passion. In fact, Nik Wallenda successfully walked over Niagara Falls on a tightrope this summer. Of course, this is an EXTREME example of facing your fears. We are not expecting ANYONE to go run out and start learning how to tightrope walk, however we can look to the Wallendas and we can be inspired to overcome our own fears, the stumbling blocks that make us stay where we are in our lives.

If they can walk across a razor-thin wire without the safety of a net, what can you do? You can make that call you have been to afraid to make, you can go for a new job, you can go back to school, you can start training for a marathon, you can put yourself out there with the confidence, knowing that you have the power to overcome your own fear.

Fear is something that you attach to yourself. You give it the power and you have the power to get rid of it.

Handicap This!

Mike

In the Next Blog Entry:  Guest Blog by Cal Thomas, My Brother's Valuable Life - “ Shortly after he was born in 1950, Marshall was diagnosed with Down syndrome. Some in the medical community referred to the intellectually disabled as "retarded" back then, long before the word became a common schoolyard epithet.”

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