overcoming fear

One memory I have from my days as a sailing instructor cheers me on winter days when I am feeling the hunger for a clean breeze and the spray of the cool waves. My student was a Polish woman who was trying to overcome a fear that had been with her for a while. Her fear of water had started when a friend of hers had drowned .  I didn't learn this until the boat (a Cape Cod mercury) capsized and we both ended up having a conversation while waiting for a rescue boat. In the murky Charles River water I was apologizing and expecting her to be upset that the boat had capsized. On the contrary she was smiling and feeling relief and pride; she had faced down her fear and vanquished it..