How facing your fears can open your world up to beauty

When I was about 8, my grandmother took me to a bird show at this outdoor historic event center in my home town. I remember how excited I was—I felt so adventurous and grown up. I loved learning and having new experiences, even at a young age. Being surrounded by adults who also loved learning made me feel very important. I was a curious little girl and was ready to soak up the world around me.

If you have never been to a bird show, let me paint you a picture. There is a large group of people who all huddle around in a big circle in the middle of the grounds (a definite pre-covid procedure!). The bird people (I’m sure there is an actual title for these specialists) stand on either end of the group with microphones. One by one, they take turns describing each bird—their nature, their unique characteristics, their preferences. And then, the bird specialist lets the bird loose to fly to their adjacent bird partner. The bird flys over the crowd, everyone ooos and ahhhhs. Rinse and repeat with the next bird. 

I was having the time of my 8-year-old life! Crowds, new knowledge, the natural world…I was wide open to experience with so much to soak in. And then, everything changed. As my inner child remembers it, as soon as this vicious, nasty, snarl-toothed bird took flight, the MFer locked his keen eyes right on my little head. He arched up only to immediately take a nose-dive straight for my head. It was probably ¼ the size of my entire body and I was terrified.

Everyone in the crowd laughed and chuckled amusing anecdotes. “Awww how cute.” It was so amusing to these full grown adults, but I was terrified. And so a phobia-like fear was born. 

I spent years terrified of birds. This experience was the start of phobia symptoms, but not the complete reason for it. The fear that plagued me for years was most certainly perpetuated and maintained by a strong avoidance of everything birds.

The sound of an owl ‘who-whoooo!’ would send me running indoors. I struggled to spend extended periods of time at the beach because of the aggressive bread-obsessed seagulls. I avoided parts of a local park where there was water because so to lived the geese who I was certain they would turn on a dime and demolish me. (Let’s be real here, though, geese are kind of jerks). My avoidance contributed to me generalizing my fear of one bird to all birds, and my generalized fear of birds made me want to avoid them at all costs. It was a vicious cycle. 

I can’t tell you exactly when this changed, because in reality there wasn’t a single moment. It wasn’t like a light-switch. I gradually started having little interactions with birds and learning that I could survive these interactions. Overtime, I learned that the fear I had at the start of seeing a bird wouldn’t last forever. I also learned that if I stuck around, my anxiety would eventually regulate.

If you’ve ever heard of exposure therapy, this is how it generally works. In a strategic way, you face the thing you fear. You learn you are safe and generally the thing you fear is safe. You see that you don’t have to avoid an experience in order for your anxiety to naturally go down.

This exposure helped reduce my anxiety, but that’s really not the point. Because what is the point of living a life without anxiety about this or that if you can’t find meaning in it? The more important lessons I learned were to set my eyes on things more meaningful than my fear of birds.

Instead of letting my fear of birds dominate, I chose curiosity about the different bird sounds when in tropical, foreign places. Instead of letting my fear of birds dominate so much that I avoided being outside, I choose to relish in the majesty of the natural parks on my trip across the United States to Alaska for graduate school. Instead of letting my fear of birds dominate, I choose to see the beauty in the symbolism of a dove, which I eventually tattooed on my body.

Little moment by little moment, I chose the beauty of experience in the world around me over my fear. I began to open up to my curiosity and engage in the world around me, just like I did as a child before I was ruled by avoidance of fear.

Now, as I hear the commanding kaw of the eagle, I feel in awe—not terror—in its presence. The sounds of the birds around me connect me more deeply to the present moment. And in this moment, as a flawk of small black birds flutter in unison above my head, I feel honored to be in the presence of the beauty of the natural world. This is an experience I never could have had if my fear—avoidance cycle was still dominating and if I hadn’t opened myself up to both the potential terror and beauty in the world.