Conquering Fear

Readers seek advice on the different kinds of phobias that grip them

The emotional intensity of reader responses has compelled me to continue on the topic of fears this week. Some of the responses are in the domain of managing phobias, in which I do not profess to be an expert. We should not be embarrassed or ashamed about having a phobia. Around 10% of the general population have a phobia that is severe enough to require clinical help. So please consult a psychotherapist or a counselor in such cases while keeping an open mind on the responses offered.

I have always had fear and anxiety about the future. As a child I was always told: Be extra careful with whatever you have, as you do not know the future. This gave me a sense of scarcity and feeling of inadequacy. Fearing the future, I wasn’t able to enjoy the present.

After reading through books and articles, I have come to the conclusion that I was creating an inadequate world for myself by thinking negatively and running away from the very source of abundance.

My old thought process is slowly changing but I still look for reassurance that the world isn’t such a bad place after all and there is enough for everyone to happily coexist.

Preeti Shinde

I have repeatedly mentioned that awareness is the first step towards a solution. You already seem to be there. All of us have our individual fears about the future, so you are in great company. Live in the moment.

As far as reassurances are concerned, its all a matter of perspective and you can certainly work towards that. A glass tumbler with 50% water can be termed both as a half-empty glass or a half-full one. Take your pick and live in abundance with the right choice!

I am afraid of heights and arguments. I am scared of people who cannot discuss but only argue and as they get offended easily.

PK (Maheshwari)

The only types of innate fear that one is born with are : a fear of falling, a fear of loud sounds and a fear of abandonment. We continue growing with them. (About your fear of heights, there’s nothing to worry about, unless you propose to walk the tightrope between two skyscrapers!

We know this because if one makes a loud noise, a baby gets startled and cries. If he is allowed to fall through a distance, he is likely to cry even if there is no actual impact. Even before a baby can actually hone his senses to perceive the world around him, these fears are present in him instinctively.

Reconsider your stand on getting scared of arguments. So long as you are not a particpant, it shouldn’t concern you. Try detaching yourself from those moments.

I am 56, but I look ten years younger, and am married with a loving husband and two college-going kids. I used to feel young and energetic until some fears started entering my mind. Over the last few years, I have lost both my parents and an only brother.

In spite of having my own family, I fear being alone, I fear flying, I fear my health is failing. Even a slight pain, especially in the left side of my body, scares me to a near nervous breakdown. 

I am known to be a fighter (I single handedly took care of my parents and brother until their last days without any help or support except from my husband, because my brother was HIV positive). But deep within, I was frustrated, sad and reluctant since I did not know how to take care of them, especially my brother. I do not like to take anti-depressants and want to strengthen my mental power to get over my fears.

I do yoga and meditate but I meditate more on my terrible experiences and most of the times I end up crying.  I am trying to involve myself in some social activity but have this nagging fear about my fluctuating health.

Doctors say I am quite healthy except for high BP problems, and my problems are mainly caused by anxiety/fears.  I am confused and do not know how to deal with myself.  I do not like to read newspapers in the morning because they are full of negative news, like accidents, murders, or terrorist activities.

Anonymous

You, yourself need to address these fears. Your past experiences seem to have left indelible impressions on your sensitive mind. Since you do yoga and also practice meditation all you need to do is to veer yourself away from meditating on negative experiences. Try creative visualization, in which you should focus on pleasing and empowering visuals and situations.

Heal your past relationships with your parents and brother. See them as happy, contented individuals, focus on the more blissful moments spent together with them. Build up on the fact that even doctors have certified you fit, what else do you want? And reading or not reading news is a matter of personal choice. Don’t indulge in it if it disturbs you.

Our thoughts create our own heavenly havens. Get set to create yours.
Keep sharing your fears and concerns.

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Thought for the Week

“I’m not afraid of storms,
for I’m learning how to sail my ship.”
Louisa May Alcott (1832 – 1888)
American Novelist
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First published in Gray Matter - The Hindustan Times

The Fear Factor

Only if we conquer fear can we begin to live. 
And there are many ways of doing so

 

This week, we will continue to discuss the topic of fear. A fear can be healthy if it cautions a person about anything that can be dangerous. But sometimes a fear is unnecessary and triggers more caution than the situation calls for. And most people develop a hatred for that which they often fear.

While fear is an emotion indispensable for our survival, only when we are no longer afraid do we actually begin to live.

Mike Tyson (the youngest boxer ever to win and lose a world heavyweight title) explains it well : “Fear is your best friend or your worst enemy. It’s like fire. If you can control it, it can cook for you; it can heat your house. If you can’t control it, it will burn everything around you and destroy you. If you can control your fear, it makes you more alert, like a deer coming across the lawn.”

Perhaps the most important thing we can do to reduce fear is to make it easier for people to accept and like themselves. Death is not the biggest fear we have; our biggest fear is taking the risk to be alive - the risk to be alive and express what we really are.

Experience has taught me that silence terrifies people the most. “The best remedy for those who are afraid, lonely or unhappy is to go outside, somewhere where they can be quiet, alone with the heavens, nature and God. Because only then does one feel that all is as it should be and that God wishes to see people happy, amidst the simple beauty of nature” says Anne Frank, author of The Diary of a Young Girl - which documents her experiences during the German occupation of the Netherlands in World War II.)

Meditation and yoga are two useful ways of putting negative thoughts and emotions to rest. I have also learned over the years that when one’s mind is prepared to face something, it diminishes fear; knowing what must be done does away with fear.

Do remember Bertrand Russell’s advice : “To conquer fear is the beginning of wisdom.” 

There are various ways to deal with your own fear, including :
• Becoming aware of it
• Identifying the ways you express fear
• Recognizing the situations which trigger fear and
• Using behavioral techniques to reduce fear and stress.

You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You must do the thing which you think you cannot do.

If you feel that fear is getting the better of you, take a moment to pause. Close your eyes, take deep slow breaths and focus your attention on the sound of your breathing.

To prepare for the flight and fight response. your body uses large amounts of glucose in your blood.  It is a good idea to drink something sweet  to quickly replenish blood sugar levels.

Try not to let your mind get carried away with negative thoughts. Focus on the “now”. By living in the moment, you will meet the need in front of you as it arises without getting caught up in the “what-ifs” and “should-haves”.

Learn to let go. Often, after something scares us, we feel the effects long after the event has occurred. Our minds tend to hold on to negative feelings, self-criticisms and apprehension. 

Try letting it all go once the threat has passed and articulate your feelings with someone you trust or a therapist (this is also called “debriefing”).

Look back not in anger, nor forward in fear, but around you in awareness, for as Percy Bysshe Shelley puts it “Fear not for the future, weep not for the past”.  

I have accepted fear as a part of life - specifically the fear of change. I have gone ahead despite the pounding in the heart that says: turn back. I am not afraid of tomorrow, for I have seen yesterday and I love today.

Keep sharing your fears and concerns,

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Thought for the Week

“Do the thing you fear to do and keep on doing it...
that is the quickest and surest way
ever yet discovered to conquer fear.”
Dale Carnegie (1888-1955)
Self-improvement Writer & Developer
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First published in Gray Matter - The Hindustan Times

Scared Of Something?

Confront it - safely - and you can conquer it

Fear is “an unpleasant and often strong emotion caused by anticipation or awareness of danger.” It is one of the basic human emotions, helping us to recognize and respond to dangerous situations and threats. It is a survival mechanism programmed into our nervous system from birth. 

The process of creating fear takes place in the brain and is entirely unconscious. When you experience fear, your breathing speeds up, your eyes widen, your heart races, your muscles tighten and your skin sweats.
All these physical responses are intended to help you survive a dangerous situation by preparing you to either run for your life or fight for your life (thus the term “fight or flight”). 

Sometimes fear is triggered by something that is startling or unexpected (like a loud noise), even if it’s not actually dangerous. That’s because the fear reaction is activated instantly — a few seconds faster than the thinking part of the brain can process or evaluate what’s happening. As soon as the brain gets enough information to realize there’s no danger (“Oh, it’s just a balloon bursting — whew!”), it turns off the fear reaction. All this can happen in seconds.

In humans, as in all animals, the purpose of fear is to promote survival. If we couldn’t be afraid, we wouldn’t survive for long. We’d be walking into oncoming traffic, stepping off rooftops and carelessly handling poisonous snakes. Experiencing fear every now and then is a normal part of life. 

Public speaking (speaking in front of others is one of the most common fears people have), going to the dentist, pain, cancer and snakes are some of the common triggers for fear. A small amount of fear before an important speech serves a purpose – it encourages you to focus on your topic and avoid making a fool of yourself. This is one of the types of fear that can be useful to sharpen our minds. 

Future-oriented fear is known as anxiety with no easily identifiable stimulus. While fear happens at the moment danger arises, anxiety is characterized by apprehension because we don’t know what’s going to happen next, and we cannot control upcoming events.

A phobia is an intense fear reaction to a particular thing or a situation. With a phobia, the fear is out of proportion to the potential danger. But to the person with the phobia, the danger feels real because the fear is so very strong.

Phobias cause people to worry about, dread, feel upset by, and avoid the things or situations they fear because the physical sensations of fear can be so intense. So having a phobia can interfere with someone’s normal activities. A person with a phobia of dogs might feel afraid to walk to school in case he or she sees a dog on the way. 

Many of us fear the same things - so do we have universal fears? This makes sense if you think about fear as an evolutionary instinct embedded in the human consciousness. 

This idea of the universal fear is supported by Fear Factor’s recent desi version “Khatron Ke Khiladi” where 13 celebrity women break away from their make-up rooms  and do some daring stunts! The emotional experiences varied between fear, disgust and horror. Consider riding a bicycle across a thin ledge across the roof tops of a 17th floor building or eating strawberries amongst a live swarm of flies, or live iguanas  licking off fruit bits from the girl’s faces.

Charles Darwin said it was a result of the instinctive tightening of muscles triggered by an evolved response to fear. To prove his point, he went to the reptile house at the London Zoological Gardens. Trying to remain perfectly calm, he stood as close to the glass as possible while a puff adder lunged toward him on the other side. Every time it happened, he grimaced and jumped back. In his diary, he writes, “My will and reason were powerless against the imagination of a danger which had never been experienced.” Darwin had never experienced the bite of a poisonous snake, and yet he reacted to it as if his life were in danger. 

We tend to avoid the situations or things we fear. But this doesn’t help us overcome fear — in fact, it can be the reverse. Avoiding something scary reinforces a fear and keeps it strong.

Fears and phobias limit our ability to get the most from life. In some cases they can prevent us living even a relatively normal life.

It is possible to overcome most kinds of fears, and not necessarily with ‘treatment’ but through learning how to manage our own thoughts and feelings. For example, people who fly despite a fear of flying can become used to unfamiliar sensations like takeoff or turbulence. They learn what to expect and have a chance to watch what others do to relax and enjoy the flight. Gradually (and safely) facing fear helps a person to overcome it.

Next week, we would continue exploring fears and how to surmount them.

What are some of your biggest fears? Fear of failure? Heights? Being alone?  losing someone close to you? Or simply sharks?

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Thought for the Week

“Nothing in life is to be feared.
It is only to be understood.”
Marie Curie (1867-1934)
Two-time Nobel Laureate in Physics & Chemistry
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First published in Gray Matter - The Hindustan Times