Preview

Coping with Fear

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
965 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Coping with Fear
Coping with Fear

It is a part of human nature to learn and adopt new ideas. According to Charles Darwin, humans continuously have been putting utmost efforts into understanding our environment and nature in order to survive and prevail on earth. It seems clear that we have invented and created countless notions and new technologies throughout history. By studying and understanding, we have overcome many stumbling blocks of our ancestors and learned several strategies of coping with the fear of the powerful or the unknown such as wild animals, diseases, natural disasters and other situations or factors that were once considered as a threat. With the help of empirical knowledge, It seems as if we are capable of understanding things beyond the domain of human beings. We are able to see, interpret and predict things millions of light-years away from us. We even started to manipulate our own genes and other genetic factors. Marie Curie asserts, “Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood.” It seems as though there is nothing we cannot understand on the basis of the knowledge gained from modern science today. Any unknown object can be categorized and interpreted based on hypotheses we have formulated. However, there are things that will never be understood by humans such as death and the existence of a soul; thus, understanding based on our science and logic can help us to conceptualize fundamental aspects of fear, but it is nearly impossible to completely overcome it through understanding. We often deal with fearful moments and events in life. Some may experience events that threaten danger such as a car accident or robbery. Some may fear encountering certain animals or insects. The way of conceptualizing fear varies depending on one’s personality and tendencies. It is true that we can easily cope with our fear by studying and understanding the consequences that will follow after encountering the events, circumstances or objects of our fear. But

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    One of the biggest “beasts” in a person’s lives is our own fears. Document A states that “children begin to people the darkness of light and forest with spirits and demons which had previously appeared only in their dreams and fairytales.” This Document also says “They externalize these fears into a figure of a “beast”. A human beings fears are tremendously powerful. Many people often find themselves…

    • 323 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Someone may think that they wouldn’t overact in a scary situation, but when it becomes a reality, then the thought process may change. Take Edgar Allen Poe’s, The Masque of the Red Death, for example the people couldn’t face their fear of death and hid from it. They failed to face the fact that they were going to die. The stories The Masque of the Red Death, The Lottery, and The Tell Tale Heart all show the reactions of fear and their reality.…

    • 401 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Fear is an unpleasant emotion which humans often experience, it comes from knowing something or someone is dangerous and might be harmful in anyway. In the George Orwell’s 1984, In William Shakespeare's King Lear, and in the lottery by shirley jackson the theme of fear is portrayed through plot, characters and symbols.…

    • 1049 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Witch Hunts Comparison

    • 553 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Most living things, be it a human or an animal, are afraid of what they do not know. In…

    • 553 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Kinnamon (2017) writes, “Fear is an emotion that does not recognize the full reality of others it is fundamentally narcissistic and thwarts compassionate identification with those ‘outside’” (p. 83). Fear is a divisive emotion, that removes us from seeking understanding or finding appreciation for those which we consider “other”. Making the distinction between real threat and our culture of fear-mongering induced anxiety is important. Some fears are of course warranted.…

    • 1841 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    There is the fight or flight that every living being uses, animal and human. Humans often have other bodily reactions to fear, such as fast heart rate, sweaty palms and many others. Often times, the same person can have different reactions to different situations. For example, when I take a big test or write an essay, my hands begin to sweat. Not only does this help me calm down, I am able to focus on the task at hand. I have had a lasting fear of “The back room” in my house, it is a room that is unfinished and is used for storage purposes. I fear the room because it has a decent amount of old stuff, the room is dusty, and it is a dwelling for many arthropods and arachnids. I do not hate the room itself, because it holds the water heater and all the tools to make my house work smoothly, but I fear what lies behind the boxes, the old board games, and the unknown inside it all. Every time I have to go back in the room, I shiver and shudder and pray that there is not any sudden movement that passes my feet. While I shiver at the thought of bugs and the unknown I also have a terrible fear of heights. My fear is so bad I can barely go on the final step of a six foot ladder. I refuse to go into the attic and I scoff at the idea of helping my sister put Christmas lights on the roof. When I do come to a situation when I am on a rooftop or on a mountain overlooking a valley, not only am I…

    • 715 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    College Paper

    • 1637 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Fear and compassion are two very different feelings that equally drive individuals. Many assume that fear and compassion have absolutely no relationship due to the fact that they are polar opposite emotions that people usually do not associate with each other. Even though they are two very different emotions, fear can be used to express one’s inner compassion. Fear and compassion are two of the most prevalent emotions used in regular human interaction, but unlike compassion, fear is obviously dreaded in society due to the fact that humans in general do like to face and deal with adverse conditions. Leslie Bell, in Hard to Get: Twenty-Something Women and the Paradox of Sexual Freedom, talks about women in early their twenties facing fear about their identities. Robert Thurman’s “Wisdom” speaks about how his experience of becoming a monk taught him to release his inner “self”. And Charles Siebert speaks about the relationship between humans and elephants in the “Elephant Crackup”. Through all of these stories it is clear and apparent that deep and intense fear drives and motivates individuals to become much more compassionate and understanding.…

    • 1637 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Fear Vs Phobias Essay

    • 972 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Fear is a natural response that humans, and in fact most animals, have. Its purpose is to activate our ‘fight or flight’ response system in case of danger.…

    • 972 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Our primal instinct provides us with a ‘fight or flight’ reaction, the outcome being dependent on the actual situation but nonetheless critical to our survival. Some situations we accept as being only superficially harmful to our well-being, especially when we have experienced a similar scenario before, our memories (and therefore our unconscious mind) permitting us to take on board mildly threatening predicaments. However, when we are in a new environment and facing an ‘unknown’ we have to react as only we know how – usually with very little time for consideration of the way we go about this or not knowing what the outcome will be.…

    • 2174 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Phobias and Addiction

    • 1486 Words
    • 6 Pages

    Kahn, A. P., and Ronald, D. M. (1999) Facing Fears . New York, New York: Checkmark Books.…

    • 1486 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    George W

    • 1136 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Myers, David G. "Do we fear the right things?." (2001): n. page. Web. 9 Feb. 2014. <http://www.davidmyers.org/Brix?pageID=65>.…

    • 1136 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Fear: the mere sight of the word makes some of us cringe. It is a feeling we have all dealt with at one time or another. Fear is the quintessential human emotion. Some people live lives devoid of joy, happiness, and pleasure, but no one escapes the experience of fear and fear’s companion, pain. We are born in fear and pain. Our lives are profoundly shaped by them, as well as our efforts to avoid them.” It is something that we first experience as children, and are conditioned to respond to in many different ways. Some of us live in constant fear; of accidents, of bad people doing us harm, or of physical ailments. Others simply take things as they come in life, whether they are good or bad things. In the dictionary, fear is defined as: "a feeling of agitation or anxiety caused by the presence or imminence of danger.  That is a rather ominous definition. Fear can also refer to general anxiety, as in "fear of speaking in public  or "fear of open areas . These fears arise not necessarily from a present or imminent threat, but rather a perceived threat, which to some can be just as scary. For most people fear is an unpleasant feeling and it is…

    • 453 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Definition Essay Fear

    • 587 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Helen Keller once said, “Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. The fearful are caught as often as the bold.” Fear is and always will be perplexing. Why is this the case? Fear is the sense that there is a person or thing which is dangerous and may lead to failure or harm. Being a sense, fear is not something that a person can fully understand. Fear is something that all people experience.…

    • 587 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Fear of the Unknown

    • 1115 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Fear is a powerful and psychological entity. Fear can make us rise to an occasion or crumble under its mighty psychosis. Fear can arise anywhere. It can come from the known and unknown. Fear can show the strong they are weak and it can show the weak they are strong. A person can learn from fear, as I have learned from being afraid. The first day attending a new school is scary to most young children. They know no one and usually don’t have any friends. Time will usually ease the child’s fear of a new school. Yes it is true. Fear is educational. My journey with fear will travel to another state and three different colleges.…

    • 1115 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Facing My Fears

    • 753 Words
    • 4 Pages

    The individual project that I did was Blood donation for the first time and STD Testing for the first time. For both of these projects I was so scared of doing. I am scared of needles when it comes to me getting poked by it. But I found out about the blood donation by walking around campus and there were signs up all over the campus about a blood drive in October. I found out about the STD testing by looking at the syllabus and looking to see my other options and I saw STD testing. So I talked to Tiffany Stacy who said she had done the STD testing so I could get more information on the STD test.…

    • 753 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays