Definition Essay Fear

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.
To understand what fear is, a person should look at some common appearances of fear in daily life. People fear many things. People fear animals: spiders, snakes, birds, chickens, cats, bugs, and insects. People fear powerful things: thunder, lightning, needles, and cancer. People fear abstractions: death, loneliness, failure, intimacy, abandonment, commitment, the unknown, success, and fear
Roosevelt said, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself…” Most people consider this to be a very wise saying, but he missed the point. Fear, similar to many things that people fear, is not a bad thing. In the same way that hunger shows the need to eat and being tired shows the need to rest, fear shows the need to react in some way. If people fear fear, how are they able to yield to the threat of pain or failure. It is no good to embrace a thing (fear) that makes you dislike that thing. It is cowardly to hide from instincts, because instincts can protect from harm and failure. This fear of failure, however, is a very threatening topic for many people. In fact, many have said that the fear of public speaking is the most common fear. Why do so many people fear the failure involved in public speaking? People want to do their best work in every moment. When someone does a paper, for example, he wants to get the best grade he can. He does not want the punishment. The threat of the punishment that makes him want to do his best is fear. It is the anxiety that occurs when the pressure mounts, and expectations are