"He that finds his soul will lose it, and he that loses his soul for my sake will find it." - Matthew 10: 39
It astonishes me now to look back and see how much of my life has been dominated by fear. A vast majority of the difficulties I have faced in life I now realize were the result of nothing more than fear. I can now see everything from procrastinating to being being shy, from avoiding people to being hostile towards them, can be accounted for by fear.
Knowing the insidious ways fear has manipulated my life has helped me to deal with it when it comes now. I don't know that I experience any less anxiety now (some less due to medication, I think), but it really doesn't matter because allowing the fear to exist without paying it much attention has worked far better than trying to fight it, or give in to it.
Letting go of fear brings the benefit of letting go of control as well. Trying to control everything is exhausting. I had never known the joy of simply accepting what is and forgetting what I want it to be.