People say they're afraid of the unknown. The new job. The move to a new city. The illness without a diagnosis. The change. The word unknown gets used as the source of the fear. K asked: have you ever met the unknown? It's the unknown. By definition, you haven't. So how could you be afraid of it?
K's answer: nobody is afraid of the unknown. Nobody has ever been. The unknown is silent. It hasn't shown up yet. What people call fear of the unknown is actually fear of losing the known. The current self. The current arrangements. The current image. The current circumstances. The fear is for the known that's about to end.
Reframe the move and a lot of things shift. The person who says they're afraid of dying — afraid of what comes after — is afraid of what's ending. The current arrangement. The self that's been built. The relationships, the work, the image. The unknown isn't the source. The known is the source. The unknown gets blamed because the unknown is convenient. It can't be inspected.
Try sitting with a transition you're facing. Notice what the fear is about. It's about losing the people you currently work with. The familiar route. The way coffee tastes at the place you go now. The version of you that fits the current circumstances. The unknown future is generic. The losses are specific.
The unknown can't be feared. The unknown isn't there to fear yet. What you fear is the death of who you currently are. The unknown is just the next step, after that death, into something you can't see. The fear is for the death. The unknown gets the blame.