The Enemy Within (Part I of Fear)

I love this song. I LOVE this song. It pushed me through so much of intense sports training I went through. To me, it's just about overcoming the only thing in your way; you. You have to live your life, conquer your fears, push through it, and stop holding yourself back. I love it. I-love-it.

I doubt anyone else sees it this way, but I think of how the devil or demons might live within us.

"Things crawl in the darkness", like in 1 Peter 5:8 "Your adversary the devil prowls around".

To be honest, I don't know how demons work, and I don't know if they can be literally within us. But I can always see them working in my life. And I feel this heavily in a hormonal way. In a sexual way.

"That imagination spins", "A surge of adrenaline" "Suspicious-looking stranger flashes you a dangerous grin" (Maybe a prostitute. I've never seen one, but still.) "Shadows across your window" (Maybe naked silhouette.)

And it's about how we should deal with it. Saying things like how we can't just resist it, we have to revolt against it. Or how we need to live life to how it should rightfully be, and not just go with the flow. To not give in to what the devil says, and to walk the real adventure that God has for us. Not just sleazing it up for the rest of our lives.

That's why I like it. It's just how I think things should be. But actually doing all that stuff, and revolting against evil, well, I'm still working on that. Good luck to everyone else as well.

I think this was the first song played on Much Music back in 1984. Seems to contain more of a funkier style rather than synthesizers, which Rush tended to use alot in the mid 1980's.

I feel you 100%, stephanierush07. It's about conquering fears and everything you said. But also about doing things for yourself -- not letting yourself get in the way.

"It's part one of a trilogy but it's the last one to appear. The last three albums have each contained a part of that trilogy, and I started thinking about them all at the same time, but they appear in the order in which they were easiest to grasp. In other words, "Witch Hunt" was the first one, dealt with that mentality of mob rule, and what happens to a bunch of people when they come together and they're afraid, and they go out and do something really stupid and really horrible. That was easy to grasp, and you see plenty of examples of that in real life as well as in fiction and in films of course, too. So that was easy to deal with. The second one was "The Weapon," and it was dealing with how people use your fears against you, as a weapon, and that took a little longer to come to grips with, but eventually I got my thinking straightened out and the images that I wanted to use, and collected them all up, and it came out. And then finally, "The Enemy Within" was more difficult, because I wanted to look at how it affects me, but it was more than about me. I don't like to be introspective as a rule. I think I'm gonna set that down as my first rule, as "never be introspective!" But, uh, I wanted to, at the same time I wanted to write about myself in a universal kind of way, I want to find things in myself that I think apply." --- Neil Peart

I kinda stole that quote from a dude that accidentally posted on an Arch Enemy song of the same name. But yeah, you get the idea.

The Enemy Within describes phobias and other situations that scare people intentionally, thus causing paranoia and worry. Instrumentally, the song begins with a sharp attack and ends by fading out, thus feeling like the first movement of a trilogy.

Typically decent lyrics by Neil, but musically..... The verses always reminded me of "The Land Down Under" and the choruses sound influenced by the Police's "Wrapped Around My Finger".

Security under pressure... People don’t realize until it’s too late that “having a job” versus living out their life’s purpose (dream) costs much more than the secure job provides - both financially and, more important, emotionally. Live your dream - NEVER have a plan B!!