With this Halloween season with haunted houses meant to scare you , I’ve been thinking a lot about fear. Am I afraid of haunted houses? No. Do I like them? No. I just don’t like putting myself in a situation where I purposely try to scare myself. The same reason I don’t watch scary movies. I have enough fear in my life, and I don’t get the point in creating more.
The other night, I had a dream about all of this that I can’t seem to shake. It was one of those dreams that just sticks in your head and you try to analyze the significant meaning. While some dreams wake me up and I’m like, “Where the world did that come from?”, some dreams, I take kind of seriously because I totally believe God speaks through dreams as He did all over scripture to some people. It’s been crazy how in the past, I’ve even known some people were pregnant before they told me because I had a dream about it. So yeah, I take dreams very seriously because I know there is greater message to be learned sometimes.
My dream the other night went something like this… (If this were a therapist office, this would be me laying on the couch as I ramble on….) The part I didn’t take very seriously was, I was in a Harry Potter kind of world. I’ve never seen Harry Potter and don’t believe in witchcraft, but stick with me. In the dream of this magical world, there was a magic wand you had to get as the goal of taking you from this world to the next. I knew getting the magic wand was the goal, but most of the dream took place in this world. For most of the dream, I was stressing about all the things I had to wrap up in this world. It was a To Do List of things I had to finish before leaving this world behind. I remember constantly saying “Wait, I need to do this… and wait, I need to do that… hold on, this has to be done.” I think half the dream was procrastination because I was scared of letting go of this world and entering a whole new world. You know, the whole fear of the unknown. But alas, I finally wrapped up what needed to be done and I walked toward my future. I finally obtained the magic wand and I was ready for the Hollywood time warp to take us into the next world.
But nothing happened.
Then some Grand Head Wizard appeared and told me congratulations. And I was so confused. ”Nothing happened, nothing changed, why are you congratulating me?” I asked.
“Because you did what a lot of people can’t. You put your past behind you and you conquered your fears.”
Whoa, wait rewind.
“You put your past behind you and you conquered your fears.”
I woke up with my head spinning. What in my past do I need to put behind, and what fear do I need to conquer? I knew there had to be some deeper meaning to what God was trying to tell me through that bizarre dream.
After much over analyzing in my head in that way I do about everything, I finally figured it out. While I won’t get too specific, because yes, I know fear can be a horribly personal topic, I did want to post that question here on the blog to ask you to think about. I don’t expect you to leave a comment and share all your vulnerable fears, but ask yourself. Think about it. Marinate on it. What from your past do you need to finally put behind you, and what fear do you need to conquer? I’m not talking sky diving or something superficial. I’m talking a deep in the gut, paralyzing thing? Maybe it’s finally taking a step toward turning your dream into a reality, and that fear of failure or fear of success. Maybe it’s forgiving someone you’ve held a grudge against, and that fear they won’t return the same forgiveness. Maybe it’s showing the world how brilliant of a person you are that you have been holding back for fear of rejection if the world really saw who you are made to be. Maybe it’s making a big purchase you have been saving for but your fear of commitment prevents you from moving forward.
Whatever your fear, let’s make a commitment to each other to conquer it. I believe you can.
