The fear of loss

Of all the fears known to us, the fear of loss is the greatest. Its mostly irrational fear coupled with insecurity of our possessions. I do not intend going all spiritual on this, but the easiest way of over come this fear is to not possess anything. Alas!!! life is not that simple, else we would have seen happy faces all around us.


I could go on and on about our possession and how we spend a fortune acquiring them and a lifetime safeguarding them... but my main focus in this post is the fear of loss that wreaks apart relationships. I have always believed that the people in our life are the most priciest possessions we have and we must treat them with the respect due to them. The word "possession" does not mean ownership in this regard, it merely means "providing value by virtue of presence". People in our life define us. It could be our friends, family or social circle, all of us go out of the way to gravitate people towards ourselves and try and maintain a close knit group of personal friends. The maintaining part is tricky.. like a wise saying; "Its easy to make friends.. very difficult to maintain them". Why do you think so many fissures occur in human relationships... be it your spouse, your girl/boy friend or your friends; the main cause of disintegration of a relationship is the fear of loss and sense of insecurity.


Its a vicious circle if you ask me. Normally, we attract a new person in our life by showcasing our positive qualities. People get attracted towards us and become a major part of our life. Then we realise, we cannot exist without these special people and try going out of the way to hold onto them. We try making ourselves an irreplaceable part of their life, and in due course resort to either manipulating them or emotionally draining them. Either ways, our attraction index begins to fall and people in our life are turned off by this "possessiveness" and parochial behaviour. The more we attempt keeping them close, the more they feel smothered and drift away. In the end, we conclude.. "people whom we love the most..end up hurting us the most", so its simply not worth it. We seldom ask ourselves, why did I chase them away with my psychotic possessiveness? Why did I let go of all the beautiful qualities that attracted people towards me and resort to cheap manipulation and emotional guilt trips is desperate bid to hold them in my life. In the end, as we can see... they still get away. The plot, sadly, is lost and the very fear of losing someone precious becomes the main reason that we end up actually losing people. Its a shame what irrational fear can do to sane people, driving them close to insanity.


I would not claim I am above all of this. I have had my share of insane moments.. just as the the next person might have had, only difference, I recognise.. and intend to change. If I ever gave out pearls of wisdom, then none was more precious than this one "You cannot guarantee the life of any relationship, the best you can do is avoid messing it up by being insecure. In the end if its supposed to die, nothing can save it and if its meant to be... nothing can stop it". Lets try and provide a sense of security to the near and dear ones in our life and not drive them away by our irrational fear. The more you cling onto life, the more painful it becomes... we all know that. Same is the case with relationships. Experience is always better second hand and I hope we all learn from my experiences in life.



So long....