FEAR

Fear is not new to human world, from early years of revolution, being scared of animals to today being scared of different situations, this is what fear is. Also it is to be noted that fear has never left humans and has even followed us in this modern age.

Fear happens to be an irrational feeling, also a lot of times it is unreal and waste of time. Also once the problem appears, the feeling of fear disappears. An erratic idea of something going wrong is what feat looks like. Fear has followed us through evolution and hence has a natural and universal presence.

In the earlier times, presence of fear assured us that we were alert with respect to wild animals, and this was required for our protection, today however the situation is missing but fear does exist even today, for safety purposes.

A child is born with two fears- one of heights and another of high pitched sounds. Fear can be divided in two major components, the real danger and the imagined threat, it is well known that today in humans it is the imagined threat that creates the alarm.

Fear has two major components, the biochemical reaction and the emotional component. The emotional component includes reacting negatively to the imagination that hits the head, and then becoming panicky due to the thought or the imagination, once into the cycle of fear, comes the physiological reaction which on a basic note extends more than the emotional reaction to fear and it is this biochemical reaction that causes stress and damages the human body, first we need to know the fact that fear is a survival mechanism and is unavoidable in nature. Adrenalin pumps up during this scenario of flight or fight response, there are other symptoms too that show that the person is actually scared, the symptoms include sweating, increased heartbeat, feeling of dread, chest pain, dry mouth, nausea, shortness of breath, sweating, trembling and upset stomach.

It is during fear that the amygdala becomes very active and creates new memories at that time so as to avoid such situations in the future, whenever one is ridden in fear for long the resultant is that fear turns into anxiety, which is a state of constant fear and is not due to any particular reason, that is how anxiety happens to be very different from fear. The state of fear when becomes very intense it is known as panic, suppose a person sees a lion, it is a state of panic that hits on at that point.

An important feature of fear is that this is one of the 7 basic emotions that exists in the human community on a whole. Fear can be induced in a person through challenging the equanimity or equilibrium of a situation, this can be physical in nature, for example getting a fever, or emotional, best example of this is telling a kid that his mother has left or even psychological which happens to be a sum of both the above processes, this will include investigations in the intelligence department.

It is also to be noted that if we can deal with the issues arising during fear the intensity of fear decreases and if we succumb to a helpless place fear increases.

Also the emotion of fear can be broadly divided in three major portions, the intensity or the amount of fear which we feel, the time duration in which we feel fearful and the act of coping through fear.

A few of the general fear triggers include darkness, heights, flying, social interaction, snakes and death.

One can recognize a person who is fearful through his or her facial features, which will include raised and pulled together brows, raised upper eyelids, tensed lower eyelids, a sense of vigilance, open and dropped jaws held horizontally backward stretched lips, on the other hand the vocal expression includes higher pitch, a strained tone or a scream or cry. The posture on the other hand signifies freezing posture or moving away from the place.

Fear has to be different in experience for self and for others, on a general note the person is more concerned about own fears rather than the fears of others, for one self, fear is unavoidable intolerable, on the other hand some people may seek fear for its adrenaline rush like watching a horror movie. For others experiencing fear we need to be more compassionate, sympathetic, to the situation.

We have a whole system of the stages of fear that may hit us, these have been divided in 4 stages,

The first stage is imagination and this is wherein the mind is let loose and the person thinks whatever he wants, thinking and thinking the person starts getting fearful of the upcoming situation, a possibility of what may happen emerges and the person at this stage becomes ready to face all the situations even while there exists no such real object of fear, the mind starts working quickly and the imagination extends in all directions.

Following this is the next stage which is fear itself, when a person starts thinking negatively, is when this stage strikes, the thing with this stage is that it is in this stage that all the symptoms of fear kick in, where it be mental, emotional or physical, the person faces up feelings and is ready to react in such a situation, it is also the stage where a person goes bout thinking all the other alternatives and also ready to act upon all those alternatives.

Following this is the next stage of paralysis and acceleration, also popularly known as the fight or flight stage, here the focus shifts from imagination to actual fear or the feelings revolving around, also the time when the logical mind has been closed off, the consequences are not seen as consequences but as utter reality and acting upon it is the way of the mind, flight or fight responses kick in during this time, during this time one of the major problem is controlling the reaction and waiting patiently for this phase to pass. It can take from a few minutes to hours.

Following this is the stage of memories, which is recorded by the mind, intense and stressful situations can lead to further strong memories which are difficult to break, this the primitive mind makes so as to remain safe in the upcoming situations like these.

One of the greatest thing about fear is that we can overcome this, slowly and steadily a person walks out of all his or her fears and can create a life where fear is controlled, talking with loved ones and mindfulness can greatly help in all such scenarios.

Reference

• https://www.paulekman.com/universal-emotions/what-is-fear/
• https://www.psychologytoday.com/intl/basics/fear