Fears of My Life
I came across my fears while writing and researching about fear to write on this topic. Read the article and you may come across your fears, and if you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the results of a hundred battles. Let's get it!
Fear is an emotion or feeling that we feel based on the belief that we are in danger. There is healthy rational fear such as fear of snakes and irrational fear such as fear of ants, public speaking, or flying on an airplane. The irrational fear can be dealt with by reprogramming our brain after embracing and facing the fears often. To find out what scares us we need to ask the right questions and think about them. I googled the right questions and tried to find out my fears based on some of them. The process of finding out the fears came with surprises.
The first question was, What do you absolutely HATE doing and how does it make you feel? On asking this I could think of all the routine tasks like washing clothes, washing utensils, etc which I absolutely hate doing. Technology has made it easy for us by introducing washing machines and dishwashers. You might be wondering, ‘Okay but how does this relate to fear!’. Even I did, which is where I came across FOMO. Fear of Missing Out. I believe these tasks take up a lot of my time which I could have spent doing something better. In turn, this something better could have improved me or made me feel good.
The next question was, What causes you anxiety? What triggers your anxiety or what makes you nervous and uneasy? This question introduced me to the fear of meeting new people and going to new places. Firstly, this fear comes from bad experiences in the past while doing any of the above. Secondly, I am not comfortable with Uncertainty as I am not a good decision-maker. Uncertainty puts me into the situation of not knowing which makes me feel uncomfortable and when I do not know things making a decision also becomes a nightmare. Change is constant in our lives and we improve due to this change but do you know what it comes along with? Uncertainty. This is why I fear change most of the time. It makes me go out of my comfort zone. Thirdly, I am mostly an Introvert, which is another thing that triggers the fear of the new and the change.
The next questions were, Are you afraid of what other people think of you? What about it scares you most? Are you comfortable with being vulnerable? If no, why not? Can you pinpoint a deeper fear? This introduced me to two fears. Firstly, I am scared of getting judged so I have an image of myself set into a person’s mind which I try to maintain. This is why I set boundaries and keep my emotions and feelings to myself. These boundaries introduce me to the fear of being vulnerable as I am now scared to openly express myself. Secondly, in Indian society, especially being a man, we are hardwired to be conscious of what we are doing and not be vulnerable to portray the strong attitude we must carry. These two fears, fear of getting judged and fear of being vulnerable are very closely related.
I have observed that the intensity of these fears depends on the situation and what happened in the past and in the recent past. The feelings that I am carrying and my confidence levels also affect the intensity of fear. After thinking about all these fears while writing they seem to be intertwined now. There seems to be a relation among these fears. Now that I am well aware of some of the fears in my life I will try to embrace and face them often. This should help me overcome them and grow. I would love to hear from you relating to this or anything else you would like to tell me.
“Nothing in life is to be feared as we all end up and end up in the same place to meet the same inevitable fate.”
Thank you for reading. Consider clapping for the article if you liked it.
Until next time, share this blog with your friends, family, and well-wishers.
Suggestions are welcome.
To read other articles written by me, Click Here.
Peace.