How to tear down walls

Uncountable walls have been built throughout history between territories, between cultures, between peoples as protection from invaders, attacks to the uniqueness, integrity of society, culture, economy, and basic human rights. Paradoxically and to our dismay, we see a revival of walls as a fashion of our day, here now in the XXI Century.

Livestock fences in Guadarrama, Spain.

But why do people build walls? Before building them physically, we, human beings build them in our minds and heart. The materialization is just a reflection of what we have inside. So why do we erect walls, and what kind of walls we build in our subconscious or consciousness? We do because we live in fear. Thinking we are separate, we create boundaries in an attempt to keep the "other" out. We are afraid of being hurt, afraid of being "naked" in front of everybody. First wall is our clothing. Yes, clothes protect us from the weather, the heat, the cold, the wind, the rain, the snow, our fragility. Then we have doors with locks. They protect our privacy, the vulnerability we invented when we started accumulating "things" for our survival and comfort. Walls make us feel secure, but also give us the illusion of stability, permanency, immutability, the illusion of suspension in time and space. Walls also guard our illusion of ownership. We imagine that what is inside the walls is our property to keep forever. More obviously, walls, nowadays physical or virtual,  protect us from invasions and attacks.

But there is a more detrimental reason why we want walls. They represent our psychological and emotional restrains and limitations to our own personal growth and expansion. Do we have a wall so we don't go out and see the real world? So we don't learn different lessons and grow? So nothing changes? So we don't change? I think some people are afraid of migrating people, because they have broken their walls, they have dared to change, to learn a new language, to think differently, even though they have probably been forced to change. People who know how to change may represent a threat to our illusory state of "eternity".

Fear is also the opposite of love, so we also erect walls because we don't love ourselves, or each other. Do we use clothes to hide? Some people wear black clothing because they have the illusion to hide the overweighted, "imperfect" body. Still others wear them too big ... to hide "inadequacies"? Others cover their faces with thick layers of makeup to hide even more "imperfections". Still others build thick walls around their behavior in order to keep the "other" away. Some cultures have a well defined "personal space" of a certain measure, so when the "other" crosses the line, they feel invaded. And still others will not even taste new foods, try new ways of doing things, meet new people, make real connections with others because they are afraid of change, afraid of what others might think of them, afraid of getting sick, afraid of the ridicule, afraid of getting hurt some way, afraid, afraid, afraid, afraid, afraid. Alienated by fear!


If we want to tear down a physical or collective wall, we need first to study our own personal "walls" (read "fears") and accept the challenge of transformation. Imperfection is fine, our imperfections are perfect. Change is unavoidable, actually, change is the only constant. We discover that we are all "damaged goods". Vulnerability is unavoidable if we are to fulfill the purpose of our coming to this life. It is OK to be one way today, and another way tomorrow. This is unavoidable too. If you don't believe it, look at your own past. It is in the state of vulnerability and mutation that we have a real life, that we can have the experiences we need for our spiritual growth, and human development.

When we discover and identify our own fears, then we can work on accept and love ourselves as we are, and let them go. The best way is to let fear overcome us, feel it, overpower us. I know it takes courage!  I have done it myself. I almost died in my first child's delivery, so I thought "if I don't have another child, I will carry this fear forever". Then I decided to have a second child to overcome my fear. The second delivery was nothing like the first, and I felt liberated. It was not the only time I tried this strategy, since then, I always do the best I can with what I have.

I also developed patience this way, because there is a process of "digestion" involved, and you need to wait for the results. Big experiences may feel like a boa eating an elephant, for example, taking months to digest it, years maybe. Some fears are like elephants, and we need to find patience, compassion, comprehension, self love, love for others to overcome them. When you discover your fear this way, you understand that we all, human beings, fear the same things; we are all in the same journey, so we can also have patience and comprehension with each other. That's when you have torn down the walls between you and the others, because you have realized that we are all afraid of the same things. We don't feel separate anymore. With the stones of the torn down wall, we have build a bridge.

Something else I discovered is that the gut sensations of fear feel the same as those of courage. When I first started writing hesitantly in English, I thought people could be laughing about my mistakes, word misuse, grammar errors, and such, and frankly, I was afraid of the ridicule. But I thought, Oh well, who doesn't make mistakes? In any case, the message goes through, which is the most important. In any case, no one will live my life and do what I am supposed to do here. So, I named those feelings, courage, and went on to write, even though I knew I needed an editor. Walls can be as simple as that, not doing what you are called to do because of your own insecurities. They may seem small walls, but they have huge effects on our development and self esteem. Fear never makes us feel good about ourselves, it diminishes us. Love does. Love instills expansion in everything we do, it breaks walls, borders and frontiers. What we do in love liberates us and others at the same time. Choose love instead of fear, and walls will fall of their own weight.