A person once came and asked me, ‘I am haunted by the fear of death. I have so much fear about losing my wealth, and about my death. Give me some solution. Please remove my fear.’

I told him, ‘Please have a cup of coffee.’ He said, ‘What do you mean?’ I said, ‘Just think of having a cup of coffee, then have a cup of coffee.’ He was not able to believe me and asked, ‘How can that help me?’

I asked him, ‘The moment you are able to think of having a cup of coffee and decide to have a cup of coffee, the death fear that is haunting your inner space has left your inner space. Am I right? Even if it is only for a split second, the fact that the thought about coffee has entered your system means that the death fear has been pushed aside!’

Unless the death fear leaves his inner space, he cannot think of having a cup of coffee, right?

We have already seen that only one thought can exist in your inner space at a time. If the older thought comes back, it means that you have consciously brought it back, like bringing back a trashed email to your inbox. So naturally, a simple thought to have a cup of coffee can remove the so-called powerful death fear.

The man said, ‘No, it looks too simple! The death fear definitely comes back, what should I do?’ If it comes back, have one more cup of coffee, that’s all!

It is just a simple understanding. Fortunately, you can have only one thought at a time. The moment a new thought comes, it means the old thought has lost its power over you. Otherwise, the new thought cannot arise.

If the old thought is so strong, it should just be able to multiply and sit on you. It shouldn’t be able to leave your inner space. So the moment a new thought comes, it means the old thought was not very powerful after all. It easily lost its power over you and left you. Because of that, the new thought has come inside. So, the moment you have a thought to have a cup of coffee or a cup of water, the so-called death fear has left you.

The man asked, ‘Suppose it comes back? I can drink a cup of coffee once, but the next time what should I do?’

I said, ‘Then drink a cup of water, that’s all!’

Understand one more thing, your very fear about the fear coming back will invite that fear back. Why do you want to empower the fear thought? It is actually just like any other thought. Why don’t you give yourself the luxury of entertaining some other thought? Because you give too much importance to the fear thought, it comes back. It is just another thought, why give undue importance to it?

You neither have to worry about your fears, nor about your greed. Your worry about your worries, your worry about your fears, and your worry about your greed is the only problem. Your fear is not the problem, your fear about the fears is the real problem.

Fear exists because of the possibility of not achieving your goal. Fear is not connected to your failure. Fear is connected to your fear of failure.

source: Living Enlightenment