Fear Factor

For Christmas I got two pets, Naomi and Simone. They are leopard geckos and insectivores. I have no problem picking up the lizards, or even the mealworms and wax worms they eat. But their main source of food is crickets and I cannot yet get myself to pick up a cricket. Instead I shake the crickets out of the jar into a Ziploc bag with vitamin or calcium supplement in it to dust them, and then let them crawl out of the bag into the lizards’ cage.

Okay, I know that the crickets are harmless. There is no way the cricket can hurt me. I’ve even eaten them before myself (already dead and covered in chocolate at a Cub Scout “Fear Factor” event), so why am I afraid to touch the crickets with my hands? When one got loose I picked it up before it could get away, so why not just do it when I feed Naomi and Simone?

My fear of touching the crickets is irrational. There is no basis for it; it is not even an overt fear. It simply is. And it is not the only irrational fear I have.

Four years ago, my son caught a garter snake in the yard and my husband told him he could keep it if he took care of it. We figured it would die the first winter. It didn’t and he still has it. I do not like the snake. When he takes the snake out of its cage, I stay in a different room if possible. I know that Bendy does not bite and he could not hurt me if he did. But I still do my best to avoid it. Over the last four years, I have had several nightmares about snakes. Yet, I know that a garter snake is harmless.

There are other fears in my life. Some have a rational and other don’t. Just as my fear of the crickets affects how I feed my geckos, most of these fears govern some area of my life. Most of the time, the effect is more significant than controlling the movement of an insect. My fear of failure prevents me from trying new things. My fear of rejection limits how easily I let someone get to know me.

Yet God tells us not to fear. It was the angels’ words whenever they appear; to Mary, to Joseph, to the shepherds. God told Joshua seven times to “Be strong and courageous” (Deut 31:6, 7, 23; Joshua 1:6, 7, 9, 18) In Romans 8:15, Paul reminds us that we “did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship. And by him we cry, ‘Abba, Father.’”

They say in recovery circles that the first step to recovery is admitting the problem. If I admit that my actions are motivated by fear and that God says not to fear because He is with me, this is the first step to not letting my fears govern my actions. Rejection by other people seems less important when I focus on God’s acceptance of me. Remembering that God will not let me fail at doing what is in His Will for my life helps me to step out in faith to do new things. I’ll let you know when I reach my hand in the cricket jar to feed Naomi and Simone.