Harbor no fear of failure

As many of my long term readers know, I took up tennis about 5 years ago, and have learned many spiritual lessons along the way, some of which I’ve shared on this blog.

I’m not a natural athlete, so how to swing a racket, hit a ball with control, and score a point, have taken a lot more work for me than perhaps to others who have run around on fields, thrown balls, and scored points since they were little kids.

But I’m progressing. Yay!

I started working with a new coach a few months ago who has brought my game a long way in a short time.

At his persistent urging, I swing at the ball with gusto and confidence now, can put on the proper topspin, and make some impressive shots.

I’m learning to drop my caution and “go for it.” It makes all the difference.

A handicap of mine on court has been caution. Not a conscious state of mind, but an unconscious fear of failure, I’ve recognized. Rather than over hitting the ball by throwing caution to the wind, I’ve pulled back and pushed the ball over the net. Well, I get the ball over the net, but I wouldn't do anything with it to win a point, and it comes wailing back at me. Not a winning strategy.

One of my “court” prayers has been to conquer the fear, let go of caution, and trust the stroke to place the ball correctly if I hit the ball correctly. It works, fabulously. Caution is leaving my game. And I'm playing much more effectively!

Fear of failure is a horrible detriment to progress.

I’ve watched my son learn to play tennis over the last 5 years, and he’s never had a fear of failure. He just goes for it every time. In his early years, he was constantly hitting the ball long, and I could easily beat him in games with my cautious strokes. But through trial and error he learned to hit the ball correctly and now he pounces all over me. It’s not even a contest anymore he is so far ahead of me in tennis skill. He didn't let fear hold him back.

I’ve applied the lesson to spiritual healing.

As fear of failure amounts to failure on the tennis court, it also becomes a huge hurdle to progress in spiritual healing.

If we harbor a fear of failure when we turn to God in prayer, we pull-back in our faith in God’s ability to heal us. Our confidence is weak, our prayers half-hearted, and our hope undermined.

Fear of failure in prayer can begin really small, like a baby seed planted in a fertile garden. It might start with an observation of someone else’s prayer that didn’t bring the intended result, or arguments from a neighbor contending that prayer doesn’t work on significant issues, or from aggressive ad campaigns touting medicines as the cure for the problem we’re praying about. Whatever the influence may be, each time we entertain a suggestion of failure and harbor a contemplation of it, it’s like watering and fertilizing that small seed in the garden which then germinates and grows into a bigger plant.

It’s best to keep the alien seed out of the bed in the first place before it grows into a monster that appears to tower over us! Don’t harbor any suggestion of failure. Don’t let your prayers get hobbled by caution and doubt.

Mary Baker Eddy wrote, “The prayer that reforms the sinner and heals the sick is an absolute faith that all things are possible to God, — a spiritual understanding of Him, an unselfed love.

I love those words “absolute faith.” Powerful, and right on.

From what I’m learning on the tennis court, caution, fear and doubt are losing strategies. They hamper freedom of movement, cause one to back off when he should be forging ahead, shackles play with indecision, produces wimpy shots that lose the game, and prevents one from advancing to the next level of play.

Failure in Science is impossible. Spiritual healing is not about fixing a body, restoring matter or repairing the human mind. It’s about reflecting God, and that comes naturally to us as children of God.

We are spiritual—now! And our spirituality possesses all the strength, health, sight, might, intelligence and life needed to fully express God. We do not lack. And that’s a truth you can pray out from with confidence.

No more fear of failure….