The Service of My Vision

By Kenneth Winfrey, in viewpoints
Tuesday, November 27 2007, 2:15AM

Kenneth Winfrey Reports

In “Dare to Be Powerful” Keith references the ever-inspiring quote of Audre Lorde, “When I dare to be powerful -- to use my strength in the service of my vision -- then it becomes less and less important whether I am afraid." This quote is powerful for me because it was, as Keith mentioned, a reminder that fear is not something which we can eliminate, but that can be made less and less important through the service of a vision.

All too often, the rebuttals for inspiration, motivation, and revelation reside in the idea of a world too imperfect and frightening for us to be powerful. However, I have come to discover what I believe Ms. Lorde meant. I realized that I didn’t have to “unlearn” or ignore fear. I realized that I needed to learn to make it less important through processes I will share with you today.

Within each of us resides the vision of who, where, and what we want to be. Often, that vision is of a place across the proverbial rivers of time and life. Those rivers can sometimes be dauntingly vast, and we don’t know what’s on the other side. Often these rivers are made purely from irrational figments of our own mind, like the fear of rejection or fear of failure. Or they can be quite “real” such as the fear of poverty or the fear of illness or death.

Each of us places a different value on each of these prospects. There are those of us who would rather die than not have our clique. There are others who would die before they spent one extra dime or minute trying to win someone else’s approval. Others would risk their lives in order to look the way they think everyone else wants them to look. Either case, where we are today is not our final destination.

For as long as we are alive, there will always be one more river to cross.

The Power of Vision

The most important thing about being powerful is to have a vision of what that power looks like. Having electricity, for example, doesn’t matter a bit unless it is harnessed to manifests through something useable, such as a light bulb or a personal computer. In order to have a vision you must dare to dream. Dreams harness the power of life within each of us to create the world we want for ourselves. If you don’t dream, you don’t let the universe know what you want. In fact, all the negativity that you may have acquired over your lifetime will be the only thing left, and the universe will give you more of it if you don’t start choosing something else.

The dare to be powerful is not only in the action required to manifest a vision. It is also in the dare to dream up the vision. Too often we talk ourselves out of a dream before it gets a chance to surface from within the waters of our minds. We argue it down, claim we’ve had too many bad days, listen to those who are telling us what we can’t or shouldn’t be doing and before we know it, we are anchored back at home under the covers--often escaping into the mindlessness of daytime television, drugs or meaningless sex.

Each time I sit down to write something, for example, I have a vision of what I want to say. The first draft doesn’t always cut it, but it’s just a river to cross. I can’t be afraid of making a “bad” draft. In fact, there are no bad drafts. Each one is a learning experience in the service of my vision. Thus, it has become less and less important whether or not I am afraid because I refuse to stop until I get it right.

Writing is just a small (but daily) example though. For a more profound example, I think back to the beginning of my high school Junior year when I had go back in that school after everyone found out that I was gay. This was when I first began to realize that we do not simply “ignore” or “walk by” our fears.

Over the summer I had called the St. Louis Public Schools several times begging and pleading with the Superintendent of Secondary Education to let me change schools. When I told him I wanted to leave because the other kids would be talking about me bad, he said, “They talked about Jesus Christ. Do you think you’re better than Jesus?” It’s a rationale that I’ve never found much solace in, but he shut me up nevertheless.

So, that day, so many years ago, I had to walk into school and face my classmates knowing that they knew more about me than I ever wanted them to know. In my mind, one worse-case scenario was total isolation, but then I realized that I had friends who had stuck by me through the whole ordeal who would probably be there even if it got worse. The next worse-case scenario was being picked on or even beat up. That’s something I had actually learned to manage because I was ahead for my age, small for my grade level and got picked on a lot.

The Commitment to Service

Getting into the service means that, regardless of the risks, you are staying on the path of that vision. You must decide that giving up or not trying is the worst-case scenario. For me, on that day in high school, it was about getting an education. You see, the worst of the worse-case scenarios was that I never went back into that building and never finished high school. That, for me, was the ultimate sacrifice that I simply couldn’t make. I loved school. I loved learning, and I had already made plans for college. There was no way that I would let this keep me back. There was also the thought that if the superintendent was going to send me back in there, he must have thought I could handle it. I stayed in the service of my vision of getting a diploma, and it has served me well.

These days, my service is very different. Today, my concerns are around maintaining my health, a business and an intimate relationship. Clients depend on me, and as a marketing professional, their image is my image. I have a voice in publications and in my spiritual community, and each day, I am faced with the possibility that I could fail not only me, but someone else.

However, again, the service of my vision is more important. Letting my business fail is not an option because I refuse to give up. Success is the only option because I believe that I have the power to make the world a better place through my work. So when I am faced with crisis and challenges, I feel that I must keep going…or die trying.

I haven’t unlearned my fear, I’ve learned to take the adrenaline of fear and use it as fuel. I’ve learned to look at the thing I fear most only long enough to steer around it. I’ve learned that the only time fear is “real” is when I am idle enough to let it invade my world and destroy what I’ve created, and I also must choose to believe that it is simply not going to happen.

The Power to Choose

The symbolism of the story of Moses and the Isrealites is a powerful one. Although I do not believe it as history, I do believe in it as a fable about the power of purpose. The Israelites knew they had to cross the Red Sea in order to get to where they needed to go. The bondage of the Egyptians is no different than the bondage we entwine unto ourselves when we, for example, take on addiction or allow relationships to remain that are dysfunctional.

Sure, they feared the Pharaoh’s wrath. They didn’t know exactly how they would get away. But they dared to be powerful enough to CHOOSE to get up and start walking, and the sea before them that seemed an obstacle was not only opened for them, but it was also used to stop the Pharaoh on his quest to keep them in bondage. Sometimes, it seems, the thing we fear the most is the thing that can protect us.

Once we face our fears of loneliness or even withdrawal from drugs, we are more powerful than they are. The sea of withdrawal can be a protection from using again, especially if you have the right kind of help such as counseling. Once you know that you can be clean and happy, the fear withdrawal isn’t as important. Once you know that you can face life with both eyes open and accept that your fate is of your own choosing, then the only withdrawal you’ll experience is the timely withdrawal of your energy from the things that don’t work.

Once you face the fear of loneliness, you know that you are sometimes the best company for yourself in the long-run. You also learn that the sea of loneliness is a quiet place of solitude where you can go to replenish your will. It becomes like the Red Sea, closing behind you as you escape the world to rediscover yourself. You come to realize that you can cross that sea anytime you want, and for me, it is something I do for at least 20 minutes a day. Like an Israelite, I wander through the desert of my own mind to find where I want to go next (i.e., the Promised Land of my life).

Finally, I do not believe in denial, or that a positive outlook is panacea. I do believe that we must look the worst-case scenarios head-on, try to create contingencies if we can, but know that the purpose of action is more important than our fear. When we know this, we have no choice but to proceed with bravery. Even as you choose, know also that you are on this Earth to learn and learning is often painful. However, despite the pain, I encourage you to stay the course with the understanding, as Susan Taylor once wrote, that there is data in your pain. Don’t fear pain. Learn from it. Use what you know to create a vision so that you can be of service to it. Then, it won’t be important whether or not you are afraid.

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