The Scariest Thing in the World to Date...

I love scary movies, do you? I have always been into scary movies and special effects. But what makes a scary movie scary?

I have also recently been taking a "Stress Management" class and a "Health and Fitness" class. I have learned about tons of diseases and psychological disorders that can cripple the mind and body. The leading preventable killer is heart disease and AIDS is the number one killer worldwide. Yet there is another killer that has been silently killing for centuries without any credit given. There is a disease/psychological disorder/condition that is without a doubt, the most dangerous of all the killers combined. It can strike man, woman and child equally, old and young, strong and weak, healthy and unhealthy. It is deadly not in the fact that it can kill you on its own, but the way it affects you can most certainly lead to death of the body, mind and/or spirit. What is this horrific monstrosity you ask? What could possibly wield that kind of power? A power sometimes stronger than the power of God Himself?
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Fear.

There was a movie I saw a long time ago called "Defending Your Life" starring Albert Brooks and Meryl Streep. In the movie, Albert Brooks plays a character that dies and in the afterlife, goes on trial to decide whether he should go back to Earth and try again or go on to what I assumed was heaven. During his trial, he looks back on various times in his life and different choices he made and he is judged not by the mistakes he made or the bad things he did, but on how he let fear affect him.
(Watch it, it's a good movie. At least watch this clip.)
The most powerful killer in the world is Fear. Fear of the past, fear of the future, fear of the unknown, fear of the known, fear of snakes and spiders, fear of the dark, fear of change, fear of monotny, fear of rejection, fear of acceptance, the list goes on and on. Fear can keep you from going to the doctor to assess your health and if a condition goes undetected long enough, no amount of miracle medications or modern advancements in science can help. Fear can keep an otherwise talented person from pursuing his/her dreams because they are to afraid of failing, so they stay in the same shitty job with no opportunity for career advancement and live in constant unhappiness, not being able to find love and ultimately wasting their lives away. Fear can be obvious, like the fear of heights or fear can be subtle, like the fear of commitment. However it affects you, fear can be debilitating. Some ride fear like a stallion and rise to the challenge by conquering it and succeeding in light of it, while some crumble in its towering shadow and simply sulk away to cower in the corner like a child that's scared of the boogeyman and the lights just went out. I have learned a lot, maybe more in the past few weeks than in the first 21 years of my life, but a lot yet and still. Although I have learned a lot of important life lessons recently, one of the most important things I have learned about is fear. everybody is afraid of something. Everybody gets afraid of something at some point in their lives. There are several things that are used to measure success in this lifetime, one of them being how you handled fear. People who live in constant fear never take chances. People who succumb to fear never find themselves risking it all. Well by definition (and cliche'), you only win big when you risk big. Of course that doesn't include the lottery but you get my meaning. Fear can kill you. Too afraid to go to the dentist, lose your teeth. Too afraid to go to the doctor, lose your health. Too afraid to commit, lose your love. Too afraid to fail, you will never succeed.

Losing/Finding My Religion

Well it's a new day and I am surviving.  Nothing has changed, but is some strange way it has.  A week ago I was spiraling down the rabbithole with no idea where my life was headed or what I was going to do with myself, yet today I'm ok.  I'm not ok because time has gone by or because life is better or because I have taken a more positive outlook on life.  I'm ok because I had some pretty random and very unexpected things happen to me and without me even knowing it, they were exactly what I needed.  How is that possible?  How does that happen?  It was as if someone else knew what I was going through, knew all about my specific personality and how I worked and arranged for some completely out-of-the-blue things to happen that would make me feel better.  It was the most accurate definition of "perfect timing" I has ever experienced.  As I think back on it, this wasn't the first time this has ever happened to me.  I can remember times before when I thought I was at the end for one reason or another and something reached down and pulled me back up.  Before, I didn't really notice it as much as I did this time because this time the things that happened were absolutely unexplainable.  There was no reason for the things that happened and never in a million years could I have expected these particular events, but I was touched by each of them in a way I will never forget.

Now I'm in no way a religious person.  If there was a section on the census for the classification of my mind, I would have checked the "scientific" box, no doubt.  I have always been a man of fact and proof, if you can't prove it, I don't buy it.  Yet there are things that happen all around the world all the time that are clearly documented as havng no explanation.  A man is lost in the desert and just as he reaches the brink of starvation and dehydration, he finds a bottle of cold water and a fresh footlong from subway.  A woman gets hit by a car head on, no seatbelt, no airbag, pregnant and walks out of the car without a scratch.  These things happen everyday and no one can explain how they happen or even how they are possible.  Of course some people do have an explanation, and his name is God.  Do I believe in God?  Well yes, I do.  Not because of having faith, more because of a lack of arrogance that keeps me from believing that we have total control of everything that happens in this world.  But I have to say, in light of recent events, I may have a little faith I didn't know about.  I'm not sure, I haven't been checked. 
Then again, how can there not be something out there somewhere doing something that we don't control?  On top of that, why do we have to be touched personally in order to believe in that something?  I had a discussion on facebook wth a friend the other day about this same subject.  People can believe in aliens, ghosts and magic and not believe in religion.  Movies about the supernatural or science fiction gross millions but religious movies barely make a buzz.  Scientists say that humans must be really concieted to think that with the millions of miles of space, we are the only ones in existence.  Yet some people have no problem believing that with the supposedly small percentage of brain power that we actually use on an average, we can actually understand everything there is to know about our existence in life and everything around us.  Well I have been to church many times and sang in the choir and I can't say that I have total belief in the stories of miracles and the trust that with faith I will be okay, but I my eyes, mind and hear are open to the possibilities.  I think God is watching and maybe He uses Fate, Coincidence and Chance as His tools of choice to make things happen.  Maybe its just one big crap shoot and luck is all we really have, I don't know.  There are times when I think that God gets unfair credit for good things that happen and is taken too easy on for bad things that happen, but sometimes...well sometimes things happen that aren't good or bad, just needed.  When that happens, I can't help but to thank God.