[seeker5]

Originally Posted by Dan.Linehan

You can't really lose everything unless you really do it intentionally. Even then, I think it would be hard.

Well, perhaps not, but the possibility is there, and the fear can be there when you undertake something radical, such as say - move to a brand new city far away, and try to start a brand new career at the same time. At least, the fear is very real for me. I think this kind of fear can really surface when people contemplate going for what they truly want and desire in life. Sometimes it requires so many changes in their life, that they sometimes fear they will lose everything. That fear can hold them back unless dealt with.

I have probably a dozen friends that I could stay with if I really needed to. How could I ever lose that unless I intentionally didn't call them? And even if i didn't, I could move back home with Mom and Dad, or with other relatives.

That's cool you have a dozen friends you could stay with. But what if you felt the huge need to leave America and wanted to move across the world and live there and would never want to come back to where you're living now? (I'm kind of doing that, except I'm looking at moving to a new city in America that I've never lived in.)

I guess you'd have to either be sure of your skills in making new friends rather quickly that would trust you to stay at their places, or you'd have to get over the fear of being homeless for a while and know you could be homeless, and yet still productive in creating a new place to live.

Your post reminds me of Fight Club in a sense -- the idea that self destruction is a path to growth. It can be, if you've build your life on falsehood, but sometimes destruction is just destruction too.

Well, I definitely don't want to lose everything. The idea is to become totally ok with losing everything so I would lose the fear of losing things. One of my fears is that I'd lose the rest of what I have (especially all the money I've saved up), and then become totally depressed and unable to function. I want to overcome that.

For example, when I became president of a failing and almost-dead toastmaster club a few years ago, I was scared my actions as president might end up destroying the club. Soon into my presidency, I realized how harmful and restrictive that fear was on me. So, I sat down and got myself to realize it would be completely ok if this 50-year old, once-great club died on my watch because of me. Once, I was freed from that fear, I really unleashed myself and was able to fully concentrate on rebuilding this club without any fears of failure. One year later the club had been transformed. So, I think it's very helpful in our overall lives too to remove our fears of losing everything so we're no longer worried about it or concerned by it when we contemplate undertaking a radical change. At least that's what I've noticed in my case.