Neorotika -Fear is Addiction.

I believe that all addiction comes from the emotion of fear. Fear of consequences and

disappointments. Fear of disaster and embarrassment. All fear is the nullification of thought

as well as creativity.

We all risk being the fool -and being exposed to others -as a pretender

or perhaps a deviant. All art if a perverse thing indeed. Fear is what kills the soul -and it is

never a good thing. It is masochism and self aggrandizement. It cause hesitation and doubt -a

sort of freezing over of all motivations. In art -fear is death. In life -fear is a sort of opium or

heroin of the senses. It is attractive because we can avoid doing the work that is needed for us

to improve and to rise above our station.

In this way -all fear is based upon the possibility of rejection. In the old tale -the children

are led off into the wilderness to die. Left their by their parents in the darkness. Such is the

fairy tale -and the protagonists meet the witch who seeks to harm them. We are all involved in

the story -and inevitably we leave our families to go out into the big bad world. The children

are left to fend for ourselves. When we were young we had this terrible feeling -that we would

be cast aside -and so the monsters of childhood follow us into our adult lives. We are afraid of

rejection -because we want to be loved. If we do not get enough love -we wither and fade away.

To ingest the drug -and to see it as your best friend is to be stranded in a limbo of confusions

and illusions. We are surrounded by lies -because (as the poet says) our eyes are jaundiced and

diseased. We accept the ultimate lie -that ‘desperation is the normal mode of life’ -and we live

accordingly. We think we can live with fear -that it is a necessary component to reality. I say

‘no.’ -because it enslaves us -and forces us to accept a fate -that is itself nebulous and negative. To

accept fear -even for a nano-second is to be annihilated. To doubt is to die in some way. As

artists -we do not have to be blocked. To trust your own dream implicitly and devoutly -is to

know that what you express is somehow sacred to you -inside your heart. No matter how dark –

or suffused with pain it is -we are compelled to pour forth -as if we were wounded. Tenderness

is something both joyful and painful -it is our own libido and self.

So if we were to cut the cancer of evil out of our heart -we would be without any sort of

prudishness and moralistic fervour. Sometimes a sense of righteousness can be the enemy. To

wonder about the right and wrong of it all -is to be inhibited by conscience. If you are confronted

with the impossible -you might shrink away from it in disbelief. You might judge it -and

seek to push it away. It is too large or too uncertain a thing -and we all want our certainties. Life

is a surprise and a miracle -it does not accept manifestos. Fear is how we simplify what is a

complex thing. Fear is the simpleton’s answer to the infinite mind of God.