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I came back to John's method because I was having anxiety about life decisions, specifically with regards to a potential spouse.

I was going to describe the specifics, but maybe it is beside the point. My question is: let's say you notice you are loosing your unconscious fear of life, which is great for you because you don't suffer anymore. But how should you go about relationships with people you care about? About decisions that will affect them?

For example... this is not my case at all, but a simpler story to put as an example. You have a wife who is very depressive, with kids, and you have a lover that you kept in secret for years.That secret made you feel terrible, because you could loose your wife and kids if that affair was discovered. Then you do the inward looking and those feelings are no more, you don't feel worried about the potential outcomes. However, your wife and children could suffer a lot. Do you think about that? If you do, will this empathy recreate fear of life somehow? Like OK, you cannot be touched, but if you care not only about you, but you plus other people (not their untouchable conscience, but their variable selves) then won't you have fear of life again because of this?

I am wondering wether I should relate at all with significant ones after some time has passed, because I have no idea how I will be if this state is permanent, or even worse... I am afraid my relationships may set me back in my progress. What do you think?

If the person in your fictive example was free of fear I'm sure he would slowly grow aware how the secret relationship was initiated out of fear. Maybe he was afraid of losing sex and excitement because of his depressed wife. As he loses his fear of the consequences he also loses this fear and gets real. Empathy doesn't recreate fear of life, it creates clarity seeing what one did wrong and willingness to make things straight. Fear of life is the origin of twisted relationship to life, and empathy or fear for one's loved ones is intelligent "fear", or care, not twisted. Can't get rid of that in this life, in my opinion.

Only you know, there is no recipe. I'd say that the anticipated suffering of wife and children is not real, but out of their fear. I think that adapting to it by avoiding the truth will not help in the long turn. I do not think that the fear of life can come back, but one can trigger buried mechanism to cope that cause fear.

Thanks for your replies. It's good to read that you don't think the fear of life can come back by empathy. I wonder if it can come back by any action one decides to take.

Maybe my concerns about this are reminiscent of the fear of life. Maybe after full recovery the fictional husband would not entertain the mind with the "what ifs". Like OK, if the secret is uncovered, he will face it then with truth and if he "loose" the kids in a trial or whatever, he will see then how to be close to them.

I am watching how I feel and react to feelings day after day. What strikes me most is that I feel awkward in my relationship with some people and also that I have sometimes very bad feelings but I would still say I am in an 8 out of 10 in happiness, strangely. Like I ask internally and I still feel OK, even though my face in the mirror would say I am in pain because of some negative emotions.

I guess my mind is recreating itself, or maybe this is all wishful thinking haha guess only time will tell.

Thanks again for connecting with me. What a wonderful thing is to have this communication tools in this century.

Hello fedemart, great to meet you too

I think a husband acts as best he can from the circumstances present, and always makes the best possible decisions from his point of view, looking or no looking. In the event he looks and finds he has nothing to fear perhaps his decisions will be more realistic and mutually beneficial for whoever's affected. Or not! A mind free of fear acts out of self-reliance but that doesn't automatically mean the husband will act in any way better or worse or more or less considerate, only that decisions made will be his own. And that's all that is needed really.

I hear you about some relationships becoming awkward following the looking. I see a growing dichotomy of thought between myself and other people as well as again and again running in to the fear of others and it stinks. What I've seen though is that nothing necessarily stays the same over time and this looks no different. Relationships are dynamic and work well one day and poorly the next. Over time though I think just by enjoying the deepening of my involvement with my own life, it follows I engage more in others' lives too. By being present with another, instead of our relationship eroding because of dialectics, I find it rather grows and flowers, and not in an abstract "BFF" way but in a human, realistic way, and it's happening because the fear is gone. What is challenging now is to meet people from my past, where they often anticipate me to act fearfully and to handle their expectations but I'm sure it will work out. The need to be liked by others doesn't have the same grip as before, finally making social life manageable and even exciting.

I don't think the fear can come back in the same way I can never not understand how two added by two is four. It's just too simple.

Yes, that seems to be my experience too (though I dont know what BFF means)

But yes, I went back to my notes on Feb. 9th to remember why I wrote this post in the first place and things turned out to go smoothly since then, with rega the relationships in my life I was really referring to.

I can summarize how I feel like this: all I want is to enjoy every moment, day by day. In my relationships that is allowing me to enjoy the time I spend with other people, and it is also making me deciding to spend more time with them. Nothing I have done during this time period seems to have affected negatively other people, maybe it will some day, but my guess is that I am more harmless and good for my loved ones when I am enjoying every moment, than when I think too much how to behave to make them good or to avoid them pain.

It's all good so far and even though I still have fears with regards to my relationships, I can see they are less than last week and the week before, so I conclude that these fears and problems are fading away with time as John predicted.

So far... feeling good.

Amazing

I'm happy to hear it fedemart!

BFF meant just overly outspoken or superficial friendships based on a fantasy, so to speak. I've had many such relationship before but not at all lately.