Life is tough. Mine is no exception, and it’s given me many legitimate reasons to fear.  One reason—a brain tumor with a 73% return rate opened my eyes to ultimate fearlessness.

In 2018, I was diagnosed with a meningioma—a noncancerous tumor on the left side of my brain. Due to bone involvement and irritation, the left side of my brain pushed over the center line to where I was weeks away from a coma.

Surgery went well. But due to a medication mishap, I had an overabundance of swelling and pressure. After a night that dragged on with pure misery, I cried out to God, told him I felt so terrible, I thought I would die. I said if this was my time, I would run into His arms with gladness. Where the misery had been overwhelming, love overwhelmed in the most amazing and never-ending way imaginable. And It extended to every person in the world as I basked in the comfort of His arms.

It changed me. Fear vanished, and I learned that love conquered fear, pain, confusion, pressure, and even time.

I went over a year without fear. Seriously, I could have parachuted from a plane, gone up in a hot air balloon, or spoken to a jeering crowd. Were it not for a balance challenge, I could have even walked a railingless bridge.

Caution has returned, but some fearlessness remains. I will still go up in a hot air balloon at some point, and I regularly speak to my writing group.

Counting it all joy.