Face your fears

The other night I was helping our oldest teenager do his homework. It was maths and he really struggles with maths (me too!). It involved little numbers and brackets and squares … and more numbers.

At first, trying to nut all this out was really complicated and we felt totally defeated, but we persevered and sweated and stuck with it … and all of sudden, as if by magic, a pattern started to appear. We both got really excited (I know, we need to get out more!), which meant my son could then fly through the rest of his homework in record time.

It was such a rewarding experience to win like this together. We had battled the evils of maths together—and we had won!

It turns out the point of the exercise was to teach how to reconstruct an equation—kind of restoring the number to its original form. That night we got to talking late into the evening because we were kind of pumped from the win. My son started to recall that when he was still in Year 6, he asked a maths question one day and everyone laughed at him—including the teacher.

Probably no one meant to be mean or malicious, but the incident really knocked my son’s confidence. In fact, it was such an embarrassing moment that he swore to himself he’d never ask another question in a maths class again—hence the reason he really struggled with maths, because he never asked questions from that day on.

Thinking about it, he said that time in class had really ‘deconstructed’ him—it had made him feel a little broken and damaged. And I could relate to that.

Deconstructed

There have been times throughout my life where I’ve been deconstructed, so to speak, either by events or people. Sometimes it’s been my own fault, and sometimes it’s come completely unexpectedly from somewhere or someone else. Something has shaken me, and after that I’ve started to react in certain ways and avoid certain situations. Because of fear.

Of course, the big problem is that none of us can grow properly when we’re constantly trying to avoid the things that cause us fear. And sometimes the things we replace them with are worse than the fear itself.

I tried all sorts of things to take the edge off the fear in my life: alcohol, casual sex, porn, even high-risk adrenalin activities that nearly got me killed. But they were only ever short-lived. And as high as they took me up, they also allowed me to fall hard on the other side. They were addictive and yet at the same time hollow. It was like being on a treadmill where I always wanted more, but nothing really delivered what I needed most.

In the end, the only thing I’ve found that really took the edge off the pain that fear produces was facing my fear and talking about it. Facing it with others who had either been through the same thing or who were old enough and wise enough to show me a way through.

Over time, I’ve come to see that fear leads to depression, and that depression can lead to suicidal thoughts, and that both of these things feed off two main things: ‘avoidance’ (or procrastination) and ‘isolation’ (a lack of connecting with and communicating with others). These things are like the fuel a fire needs to rage. But if you do the opposite to avoidance and isolation—if you confront and communicate—the self-destructive fire tends to go out. It’s much harder to confront and communicate, because it takes effort. But it’s totally worth it!

Reconstructed

And so my boy and I talked about his time in class that day and other times that had eroded his confidence. We looked at ways he could do what the little number outside the brackets did in his homework equation: reconstruct himself back to the number he was before that event. And that number is a 10-out-of-10 (well, it is to me)!

He said he’d try to work on not feeling so self-conscious and afraid about asking questions in class. Maybe he’d start in a class where he was more confident, like with Art Graphics or something, and maybe even with a question he already knew the answer to. And then slowly, day by day, he’d build up to asking a question in maths that he didn’t know the answer to. Progress rarely happens in huge jumps—more often than not, it happens in small, incremental steps.

I told my son that even though everyone laughed at him that day, he didn’t have to let it become the defining moment of his life. He could learn from it. And he could grow from it if he continued to confront it and talk about it with others (by asking questions).

I said, ‘If that ever happens to you again, don’t let it get to you, because there are people who believe in you—myself, your grandfathers on both sides—and those who went before you will be looking down on you with pride. Others may not see the effort you have to make to ask a question, but we do!’

I told him to never stop asking questions, to never stop surrounding himself with people who believe in him. And to be that kind of person for others—someone who believes in them and encourages them. Someone who fuels confidence and faith, rather than fear and isolation.

For all the guys out there who might be trying to look brave and staunch and who might really be feeling worried and afraid: don’t worry about what others think of you, and don’t be afraid to be yourself—because the people who may have laughed at you in the past won’t be with you when you leave school. They won’t stay with you throughout your life.

Your life is your message to the world, so make sure it’s inspiring. Allow yourself more moments of awe and wonder and passion and grace. Don’t let anyone’s ignorance, hate, drama or negativity hold you back. Most of all, don’t let people dim your light simply because it’s shining in their eyes!

I finished talking that night by saying that, for me, a lot of the time the little number outside the brackets is Jesus (if I was to draw a comparison with the maths homework we had been doing). When I trust in Jesus, he reconstructs me to the way I was before all the things in life that tried to break me down and deconstruct me happened. Jesus gives me a chance to start over, because he knows me, gets me and loves me.

You know, even though I hate doing maths, I wouldn’t trade that evening with my son for the world. And yet I wonder how many golden opportunities like this I’ve missed in the past because I was either too busy or too preoccupied with my own challenges.

I hope I never stop finding those magical patterns in life with my family and friends. I reckon God puts those moments there for all of us, if we’ll just keep making the effort and keep on trying—even in the most difficult of times.

Captain Ralph Hargest is a Divisional Youth Secretary with his wife Nicky in the Northern Division.

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by Ralph Hargest| (c) 'War Cry' magazine, 6 September 2014, pp20-21.
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