On Fear & Truth

Submerged in a cold plunge, shivering to the bone, I got the download I was looking for.

For some reason, when I am intentionally suffering, and deliberately focusing on my suffering, these spiritual messages (or downloads as I like to call them) come effortlessly.

When I am just going about my day, it doesn’t really seem like they flow as easily, they seem forced.

But up to my neck in 32℉ water, I asked the question I wanted the answer to.

“Where am I not living in alignment?”

“Fear.”

Everything seemed to cease to exist around me, it was just me and that thought.

And it sat with me for the rest of the day, I continuously asked myself, where is fear showing up in my life?

But then I took that question and turned it around in a way that made it easier to correct my actions, so they could line up with the proper thoughts and beliefs.

“How would I act if I had total faith?”

My good friend Stefan is hosting an event in Austin, TX at the end of the month and I told him I would buy a ticket and attend.

But the ticket isn’t $30, it’s $3,000.

It’s not much in the grand scheme of things, and the event is for sure 10X worth the value, but for some reason, I felt some resistance and kept putting off the purchase.

That really didn’t feel good the more I sat with it, I do my best to stay true to my word, and I told my friend I was going to support him at this event.

And it hit me that I was putting off the purchase because of fear.

Fear of losing money, and at a deeper core, fear of running out of money.

Now realistically that’s never going to happen, I would seriously need to fall off the deep end to lose all of my money…

But I don’t gaslight my emotions and say they don’t make sense, I know that fear is there…

But I decided to act in spite of that fear, pulled out my card, and bought the ticket.

It felt good to keep my word and not be so stingy with my money.

But the question kept attacking me…

“Where else am I acting out of fear? How would I act if I had total faith knowing that everything will work out for the better?”

Took me a few hours but the answer came to me.

There’s a group I was a part of that I was paying monthly access for.

About $1000, nothing huge, but the money isn’t the reason I wanted to leave…

The leader/guru/owner of this group had lost my respect lately with some of his actions, I didn’t want to keep paying money to someone who I didn’t respect.

And funny enough, we had a group call yesterday and the topic was fear.

I don’t believe in coincidences.

Anyways, in the past few weeks, there’s been multiple jabs at me on group calls that were positioned as jokes, but every joke is only so much a joke when it’s personal…

It’s one thing when it’s one on one, but in a group setting, not okay.

And I won’t go into all the details because it requires more context than I care to explain in this substack, but he had in my opinion,  been acting out of pride and spite…

Neither of which I take too kindly towards, especially when it’s directed towards a good friend of mine.

Now, let me make this very clear.

The only thing my gut was telling me was this is not someone you need to learn from, end the student-teacher relationship.

I still think of him as a friend, but some people need to stay friends.

I sat looking at my phone for a few minutes not sure what to say.

Straight forward seemed like the best approach.

“Hey dude, I’m going to have to opt-out of the group after this month, I’m not sure when my next rebill is but please cancel it for me.”

He said sure, but then asked me what the reason was…

And this is where I saw the fear.

Fear of confrontation.

It’s easy to do it with a stranger online, but try doing it with one of your friends.

Not as easy.

I could’ve easily just not responded…

I could’ve easily just made up a reason about money…

I could’ve easily made up some excuse…

At times when I’m not sure what to do, I reach out to men I respect.

And this time I reached out to my good friend Erin, who curates a lot of his messaging online around helping men to stop acting like a Passive-Aggressive Man (PAM).

I asked his thoughts on the situation, and he said “Just be honest and tell him the truth, could be a learning opportunity for him.”

Damnit.

Fine!

I gave him a call, told him my feelings about his actions, but made sure to say I don’t want this to affect our personal relationship, and that I do still value the information he’s brought to the group.

What ensued was about a 30-minute dialogue that meant absolutely nothing.

It was a philosophical debate on values, morals, ethics, beliefs, and so on.

I honestly should’ve cut it off at about 5 minutes but I do enjoy a good idea sparring session, maybe that’s something I need to work on.

We ended the call, I’m no longer a part of the group, and it seemed like we ended the call on good terms.

And then almost immediately after I got this text…

Seems like whatever I was doing the universe wanted to affirm it.

By the way, this wasn’t a random stranger, it was a former client paying me for past services.

That would be really cool if it was just money falling from the sky, but I had worked for this, so it’s the next best thing.

Again, I don’t believe in coincidences.

The timing of that to me seemed like a sign, “This is how you act. It’s not about being confrontational. It’s about communicating how you truly feel without any fear of loss.”

The reason this makes sense to me is that it’s an embodiment of the concept of faith.

The idea is that nothing brings a better world into being than the state of truth.

And that may create some consequences…

But that’s something you need to be willing to accept.

Because there’s going to be consequences for every single action you don’t take…

You don’t get to choose to not pay a price, you get to choose which price you’re going to pay.

Acting in total alignment with your highest self means your actions MUST be based on truth.

I stray from this, I believe we all do…

But this is why I believe you need to leave space for that dialogue with God, instead of trying to fill every waking moment of your time with distractions…

Those downloads are what help get you back on the path.

Leave some space, listen to the downloads, and align your actions with what you know to be true.