The first of Aristotle’s moral virtues.
When overwhelmed by fear, we’re tempted to yield to cowardice.
When we fail to give due respect to our fears, we can take unnecessary risks and become reckless.
Fear wears many faces. Have you ever experienced any of these?
Fear that I will die young
Fear of failure
Fear of rejection
Fear that we are faking it.
Fear of Death
Fear of poverty
Fear of failing to live up to expectations (internal tyranny of mother or father)
Fear of being alone
Fear of trying something new
When people act in strange ways, in ways that don’t make sense, often there is an irrational fear behind their behaviors. Here’s one example, a verse from the Proverbs:
The lazy person claims, “There’s a lion out there! If I go outside, I might be killed!” (Prov. 22:13, New Living Translation) The person making the claim (“There’s a lion in the streets.”) uses the lion as a pretext to justify his laziness. In other words, what people say often conceals, rather than reveals, what is really going on inside.
