Almost forty years ago, when my second son was young, I started having dreams of an atomic bomb exploding. One time it was in a playground… another time I could see it in the distance. In every dream my son would be in my arms, my precious little baby, and I would be running and searching, experiencing tremendous fear. It was not a fear that he or we would die… it was a fear that his life would be worse than death, and I could not save him from it.

Well, no atomic bombs fell nearby, he lived and experienced easy and hard times, became daddy to two beautiful children, ­­made a good life for himself and his family, and happily for me, he kept on loving his ‘spiritually minded’ mother.

I don’t know what triggered the dreams. It could have been that I was tapping into the fear of the collective mind… also could have been the arguments going on at the time regarding nuclear power. I remember asking a business executive, “What about the radioactive waste… what about future generations?” He responded, “By that time they’ll have figured out how to handle it.” I heard my inner voice say, “I could never get with this person… he’s an absolute idiot.”

Well… I was young. Idiots are not absolute… they can change.  When the threat becomes immediate even the most cold-hearted can wake up… and I imagine quite a few have. But the point is, life has sent me into fear plenty of times, so I know how overwhelming, controlling and confining it can be.  And the funny thing about it… there is no benefit to it: being aware, yes; perceiving danger, yes; avoiding danger, yes; but fear… it’s a lose/lose.

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