Courage To Be Someone New

Have you ever felt paralyzed or crippled by fear? As a businesswoman, producer, and model through my various Business ventures, I've felt fearful from time to time. And I'm sure that, like me, you've found that you can accomplish little when you're afraid -- and almost nothing if you let fear of what might happen seize you. Fear freezes the mind, erases possibilities and clouds opportunities; and it makes most matters we're fearful about seem disproportionately greater than our ability to deal with them.

However, I've learned that you and I have the ability to put fear in its rightful place -- a place where we don't have to stay. Yet sometimes situations we're frightened about have to get worse before things can get better. Sometimes not until something or someone hurts us and/or wounds us badly or deeply enough do we realize that we have to go beyond fear to make a change.

I remember vividly some of the most unpleasant challenges I've had to face to earn respect and defeat fear. In 1987, I moved from my Homeland, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, to Vancouver, Canada, to continue high school for post-secondary education. I found myself a stranger there -- a funny looking "foreign" girl with a bad haircut and poor English skills. And soon, I became the prime target for the supposedly "cool" high school kids around me to antagonize. And believe me, they did their best to make my life miserable. I couldn't hide from them; they seemed to be everywhere, taunting me. They'd throw objects at me from behind my back; they'd push and trip me when I wasn't looking. They'd sabotage my every chance to be part of any extra school activity I wanted to pursue; they'd point at me and laugh, call me names, and torment me in countless other ways, too.

But because I was extremely unfamiliar with Canadian culture and lifestyles, and for fear that I might say or do something wrong, I decided I'd just tolerate the situation. Though I was already a competitive martial arts fighter in the process of earning my second black belt in Karate, (a sport I've been involved in since I was eight years old), I didn't feel that I should utilize those skills. Again, I feared I might provoke my tormentors further and possibly even incite them to extend harm to my family.

So during most of those high school years I allowed emotions like fear, loneliness, anxiety, anger and sadness to consume me. Yet eventually even those feelings, however negative, forced me to find courage to turn my situation in positive directions, and as a result I can now help others in similar circumstances to do the same.

I decided that every time my tormentors tried to start a fight with me, I would look each of them in the eyes and just calmly walk away. What worse could happen than that they'd push me, laugh and call me names? However, one afternoon, things did turn worse.

That afternoon I felt a couple of small objects hit the back of my head. As usual, bursts of laughter behind my back followed, and I continued on my way, refusing to even acknowledge this petty behavior. But this time I made no effort to keep my eyes on my tormentors as I walked away. Suddenly one of them decided to run up and strike me in the left eye. In an instant, I realized that she had crossed a boundary and endangered a vital organ of my body, and this I simply couldn't ignore. Before she could blink, with a crowd of students as my witnesses, I unleashed a kick that dropped her to the ground. Quickly, two of her friends leaped at me to defend her. Soon they, too, were picking themselves up, and then all three made a run for it, leaving me standing there. Now I began to feel the throbbing pain in my left eye -- and discovered that it was bleeding.

For many years, I'd tried to avoid confrontations with my tormentors. But that afternoon they'd made confrontation inevitable, and I had put fear aside and finally let them know who I truly was. Now I wondered what the consequences of my retaliation would be.

Shortly after the fight I was called into the principal's office. There I was told that the three girls who started the fight had been suspended from school. The other students who'd witnessed the encounter had reported the story of the attack and my self-defense. Luckily f