Moving beyond fear.

heather
Nov 23, 2025
9 min read

Updated: Nov 26, 2025

Dear Ones,

Wisdom is calling us to know, rest in, trust, and embody down to the cellular level, our capacity to operate from the deeper self rooted in Origin, God, the Holy One. From this rooted and awake inner stance, we can move beyond our automatic fear and the aggression that often follows. There is a reason the most common charge in the ancient biblical texts is “Do not be afraid” or “Fear not.” Humans, like all other animals, experience fear as automatic, overwhelming, and persistent. It is a physiological response that is normal, adaptive and essential for survival. It cannot, nor should it, be shut off by sheer will or by spiritual pressure. These ancient words are not about eliminating fear, but about orienting us to a deeper source of safety, a source always present and accessible when we have eyes to see.

While fear is undeniably real, it is not the deepest truth. Understanding how our nervous systems function and engaging practices of regulation, orientation, and attunement to the ever present support and assistance available to us, creates the conditions for moving beyond fear. Whenever Scripture says, “Do not be afraid” or “fear not,” those words are accompanied by perspective, reassurance of presence, and promises of strength and sustenance such as: “I am with you,” “ I will strengthen you,” “I will help you,” “I will uphold you” (Isaiah 41:10). These words remind us that fear, while natural, does not define our ultimate reality.

As we meet our fear, it is important to remember that although fear is a natural reactive response, arising from subcortical systems, it is not a matter of moral or spiritual failure. Fear is not a problem to solve or to eradicate. When our nervous systems are caught in the activation pattern of fear, we are instead invited into to stewardship, tending our system rather than forcing it. Attempting to make ourselves “not afraid,” especially from a dysregulated state, often increases fear, shame, or dissociation because our system is not ready.

In Who Do We Choose to Be?, Margaret J. Wheatley writes:

“The human brain is an extraordinary creation with its large frontal lobes, the cerebral cortex. This is the site of our most wonderful human capacities: clarity, compassion, patience, empathy, imagination, forward thinking, and thoughtful responses. Yet our present chaotic culture is so fearful, so threatening, that these finest qualities are shut down automatically. When threatened, we lose the essential human capacities most needed and, at the neurobiological level, we have no choice but to contract in fear” (p. 133).

When we remain contracted in fear, it becomes difficult to remember what we know to be true when we are not contracted in fear. Staying rooted in the self beyond the reactive self who feels acted upon by life requires intention, discipline, and training. Wheatley continues:

“To respond rather than react… requires intention, discipline, and training. We have to want to use our fine human capacities; we have to want to be more open and less fearful. We have to want to be generous, creative, and kind-our human birthright.”

It is not about overriding our reptilian brain, but about engaging practices that allow us to restore the natural oscillation activation and deactivation, allowing the nervous system to function as it was designed. From this restored rhythm, we gain access to deeper seeing and can operate in alignment with the Wisdom that already exists within us and around us, always available to assist, guide, and support our lives.

Wisdom is beautifully described in Wisdom of Solomon 7:22-28, (translated by Rabbi Rami Shapiro with gendered language removed as Wisdom is beyond masculine and feminine]:

What is Wisdom?

[Wisdom] is distinct, invulnerable, good,

keen, irresistible, and gracious;

[Wisdom] is humane, faithful, sure, calm,

all-powerful, all-seeing, and

available to all who are intelligent, pure,

and altogether simple.

[Wisdom] is the mobility of all movement;

[Wisdom] is the transparent nothing that pervades all things.

[Wisdom] is the breath of God,

A clear emanation of Divine Glory,

No impurity can stain Wisdom.

[Wisdom] is God's spotless mirror reflecting eternal light

and the image of divine goodness.

Although [Wisdom] is one,

[Wisdom] does all things.

Without leaving [Wisdom's] self

renews all things.

Generation after generation [Wisdom] slips into holy souls.

Making them friends of God and prophets;

for God loves none more than they who dwell with Wisdom.

As Cynthia Bourgeult often reminds us, Murat Yagan taught that all spiritual practice is about regulating the nervous system. Wheatley echoes this truth:

“The core teachings from many spiritual traditions teach skills to awaken our better brains and enable higher capacities. In different forms, but from the same wisdom, these spiritual teachings offer practices to pause, settle, open, identify emotional triggers, notice reactions, practice patience, refrain from judgments, overcome bias, make moral decisions. It takes work to be a human being rather than a human animal! Robert Sapolsky, a brilliant neurobiologist whose work has educated me, defines the frontal cortex's role as "making you do the harder thing when it's the right thing to do" (p. 135)

Of course, many animals exhibit astonishing capacities beyond our own when we are trapped in patterns of fear and/or aggression. Being under the influence of our amygdala alone is the point of Gospel of Thomas Logion 7: “Yeshua says… A lion eaten by a man is blessed as it changes to human form, but a human devoured by a lion is cursed as lion becomes human” (translation Lynn Bauman). This is not to pick on lions, but to illustrate that operating entirely from survival instincts, rather than our whole selves, often leads to suffering for ourselves and others.

When we understand that all of our work to steward our nervous systems serves the possibility of a deeper visionary seeing and capacity to operate in alignment with Wisdom, we can approach these practices as spiritual practices. Steve Hoskinson, founder of Organic Intelligence, suggests that rather than pushing through, overriding, or thinking positively to escape fear, we can orient our systems to what is safe, pleasant, and supportive and our nervous system begins to regulate naturally.

Orienting ourselves to Wisdom is a way of putting our attention on what is safe, pleasant, and supportive—all the ways we are accompanied and secure in the deepest sense of our being. Even in the midst of fear and challenge, we have a choice in who we are and how we show up in the world. Let’s continue to do this whatever it takes to allow Wisdom to slip into our holy souls, making us friends of God and prophets, dwelling in, with, and as Wisdom.

With love,

Heather

Readings from last week's Daily Contemplative Pauses

*All previous readings & reflections can be found here*

Monday, November 17th

Reading: "Place your mind before the mirror of eternity! Place your soul in the brilliance of glory! Place your heart in the figure of the divine substance, and through Contemplation, allow your entire being to be transformed into the image of the Godhead itself, so that you may taste the hidden sweetness that God has reserved for his lovers." – St. Claire, Armstrong, Third Letter to Agnes of Prague, Claire of Assisi, Early Documents, p. 5

Chant: Let my trust be in your Mercy, let my hope be in your Love – Henry Schoenfield

Tuesday, November 18th

Reading: "If you love the justice of Jesus Christ more than you fear human judgment then you will seek to do compassion. Compassion means that if I see my friend and my enemy in equal need, I shall help them both equally. Justice demands that we seek and find the stranger, the broken, the prisoner and comfort them and offer them our help. Here lies the holy compassion of God that causes the devils much distress." – Mechthilde of Magdeburg, Woodruff, Meditations with Mechthilde

Thursday, November 20th

Reading: "How do those deeper esoteric truths manage to hide in plain sight? Simple: they hide out in those vacant places within us where we do not as yet fully occupy ourselves.

"That is the unanimous testimony of the esoteric teaching itself, spoken or alluded to in so many different ways. Strewn throughout the gospels both canonical and so-called “gnostic” are those constant reminders: to wake up, lighten up, be vigilant, be alert to the sudden onrush of the awakening moment. From the Gospel of Thomas: “Pay attention to the one in the presence before you, and all that is hidden will be revealed.” From the Gospel of John, in Jesus’s own words: “There are many more things that I could tell you, but you would not be able to bear them” —and a teaching un-borne remains a teaching unborn. The limiting factor lies not in the teaching itself, but in our capacity to receive it, integrate it—embody it—and ultimately, to act out of it with inner unanimity and force. The line of demarcation between exoteric and “esoteric” runs straight down the center of our being.

“'As your being increases, your receptivity to higher meaning increases; as your being decreases, the old meanings return.' So states Maurice Nicoll, one of the first generation students of the Gurdjieff Work. Not only in the Work, however, but across a far broader spectrum of Wisdom teaching, it is widely acknowledged that we human beings in our usual state of consciousness come with two fundamental liabilities: (1) Our attention is scattered; we are all over the map, weathercocking between conflicting self-images and obligations. (2) We not only assent but actively collude in keeping ourselves in the dark about the inner fragmentation and cacophony that we proudly call our “waking consciousness.” To the extent to which we remain unaware of our inner dividedness, we provide esoteric teaching with its ready-made bodyguard: our own sham sense of “selfhood,” the conviction that there is a stable “I” at the helm in control of all of this. That phony I is the real gatekeeper. To the extent that it is in charge, nothing of real spiritual substance will penetrate." – Cynthia Bourgeault, The Invisible Bodyguard on Substack

Friday, November 21st with Tom

Reading: "It’s a wild ride out there just now, and Wisdom teaching has never been more needed. To paraphrase one of my favorite quotes (from Clarissa Pinkola Estés), Wisdom was made for these times. The underground river has come above ground and is running full tilt.

What is the distinctive Wisdom message for our times? Someone dubbed it “contemplation with grit.” In distinction to a conventional contemplative stance, which may surrender a few steps too soon; or traditional activism, which burns itself out in anger; or the despair voiced by many that we are helpless, victims, impotent, scattered, fragile, Wisdom has offered a powerful middle ground, calling forth the quality I have called mêtis—bold, skillful holding of the present moment, sometimes in action, sometimes in quiet, always in demonstrable connection and receptivity to a higher infusing power.

Melding traditional contemplative surrender with perennial reference points in mindfulness and the infusing power of divine providence, Wisdom Waypoints has stepped up to the plate. People are finding their way to our offerings: to replenish hope, banish fear, relearn resilience and trust, and form intentional networks circling our globe through which this new energy is being radiated outward.

Here’s how “contemplation with grit” was recently described in a seminar I led:

“As our world and planetary systems reel in the grip of what many sense to be a thickening pandemic of evil, the Wisdom perspective is urgently needed. We believe that only from this broader cosmic and integrative perspective can sufficient leverage be found to work effectively with the escalating disintegration—political, cultural, ecological, spiritual—so apparent in our own times.” – Cynthia Bourgeault, Wisdom Waypoint’s email on 11/21/25

What the Friend Wants Done by Rumi

One who does what the Friend wants done

will never need a Friend.

There is a bankruptcy that is pure gain.

The moon stays bright

when it does not avoid the night.

A rose's rarest essence

lives in the thorn.

Chant: In love alone, I take my rest, I dwell, unafraid. In love alone, we take our rest, we dwell, unafraid – Kirsty Christian

Saturday, November 22nd

Reading: What is Wisdom?

[Wisdom] is intelligent, holy, unique, subtle,

flowing, transparent, and pure;