I was a reading a news report this morning, a serious one, about a young man who died on the rails of the French metro system, in a freakish incident. He was grabbed from the crowd at random, and pulled in front of an arriving train by a crazy man who took a complete stranger along with him as he committed suicide.
Friends and family are in shock; those commuters who witnessed the bizarre scene are, understandably, haunted by what they saw.
What haunts us?
Don’t we all have images that haunt us? Real or imagined – the death of a loved one, childhood trauma, a secret terror?
I still flash to the accident of three years ago, those instants before the other car slammed into us. That is a memory that haunts me, yet keeps me aware of how fortunate I am.
An old friend, one of the strongest and most courageous women I’ve ever known, is terrified of spiders. She is otherwise utterly fearless, having toughed out hard knocks and medical dramas most of us couldn’t imagine. But put her in a room with a few cobwebby corners?
She’s stricken. Her panic is palpable.
You have nothing to fear but fear itself
I think of this phrase often: you have nothing to fear but fear itself, spoken by Franklin Delano Roosevelt at his 1932 Inaugural. The exact quote:
The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.
FDR pronounced these words during a time of depression and global unease. The power in his message lies in the reminder that fear will paralyze, and in paralysis we accomplish nothing because we attempt nothing.
And so, when I sense debilitating emotion creeping in around my edges, I recall this phrase. I fight back, fully aware of the impact of worry, stress, and fear on physical health and well-being. I don’t always succeed, but I try to deal with whatever is frightening me, move beyond its paralyzing potency, and forge ahead. Smartly.
Parenting and fear
Like most parents, I don’t think I knew true fear until I became a mother. Fear lives inside the tiniest microbe that might endanger a child’s health, or the stranger lurking behind a fence who may threaten her safety.
When it comes to children, most of us don’t hesitate to do whatever it takes to keep them whole, happy, and out of harm’s way. In the face of menace, fear evaporates and we act, protecting them at all cost – whether they realize we’re doing so or not.
What frightens me
For the record, I am terrified of:
- anything that threatens my sons
- snakes – any type, anywhere
- being stuck in a crowded elevator
- choking on a chicken bone like Elizabeth Taylor, and no one to help (and no Oscar afterward)
- spare ribs on a first date (and no toothpick)
- homelessness
- never dancing again.
It’s an odd mix (yes, there’s more), and I confess to a touch of the wry along with the real. Yet the fact remains that when trapped in an elevator (even for a few minutes), my chest tightens, I break out in a sweat, and I hyperventilate.
Do I ride in elevators? Sure, but not without a tiny act of bravery each and every time.
Of course, there is plenty that does not frighten me, and I also know that fear is part of life. As is the case with grief or anger, I’m not sure we overcome fear, so much as we ultimately learn to manage it.
I am terrified of flying. Terrified. And it is all about managing it. I would give anything to get over it, but I will settle for managing it. Of course, since I have this fear, I went out and became a consultant who constantly travels for a living. Smart, right? I used to hope that I would eventually become desensitized to it since I do it so much. Nope. I find that the intensity of it comes and goes – usually with my stress levels – but that it is always there.
What fear really paralyzes is the brain and then we make questionable decisions without our best judgment involved.
Maintenance is a good goal!
This goes along with what April said. My biggest fear is making the wrong decision while gripped with fear.
I’m a great problem solver but normally it takes me a while to solve a problem…one that produces fear anyway. I doubt my ability to think clearly, make the right choice, hence I ponder all solutions over and over in my head. Can be frustrating for me and those depending on me for a solution to a problem.
I’m a generic worrier, and lots of things trigger the worry. But I try to talk back to it — sometimes (a trick someone taught me) using a big mental “STOP” sign helps calm the fear. Also facing our fears is often the best medicine — the ones that we are able to face. Other ones, like the idea of something hurting your kids, are part of the wildness of motherhood.
Mice. (Sorry, I know that could be considered a blow beneath the belt considering your current house guest.)
Cockroaches.
Public failure.
Being in the passenger seat.
Swimming in the ocean.
When fear takes hold of us, it can make us immobile, not just for the moment but in our lives. I am petrified of entering and exiting the freeway. I’m fine off and on it, it’s the ramps and merging that do me in…crazy, I know.
I’m afraid of so many things, but my biggest fears — the ones that make me hyperventilate — all revolve around my children. I imagine when they are grown and surviving on their own, I’ll have the biggest exhale imaginable.
When it comes to our kids, I think we exhale – and, not so much. My mother tried to explain this to me once (I was in my 20s). Of course, single at the time, it went in one ear and out the other. With one son now in college (and the other still at home), I get what my mother meant. It is much less of a constant worry, and not the little worries. And there is an exhale of sorts when they are “launched.” But the bond, the way a child is lodged inside your heart as a parent, it’s always there. So, too, some degree of fear and worry.
I watched Paranormal Activity on DVD with a girl friend. After that, she couldn’t sleep for a week. I had no problem. I hear noises in the night, and I kind of like it. Even if I can’t name the noise (toilet self-flushing, ice maker dropping a cube, squirrel on the roof), at least I know I’m alive, and living in a place that has life.
I am scared of snakes, though!
The simple thought of being without my wife and kids scares me more than anything.
I saw you left a note on Big City Dads blog about not being able to leave a comment on my blog. I have no idea of how to do whatever you were talking about. I will ask the wife and figure it out.
Thanks for kind words.
Nice to meet you Scott – and yes, you fixed it! Merci! Now I can come visit (along with all my shoes)… tra la.
And I’m with you, on the fear thing. If you notice, yesterday on a quickie fill-in-the-blanks post, what I dread is empty nest. I’m half way there, Son #1 in college now, and his “little” brother isn’t too far off. The thought of both them not in my life, daily, is … well, we won’t go there.
I agree with you; we learn to manage it. It lurks in there somewhere…
I’m scared of being confined. I was trapped in the elevator at the Queen Mary with my mom for 6 hours when I was 5 years old. To this day I can’t be in a confined space without freaking out. I know that’s a big one, but other than that I’m not really terribly frightened of anything else.
Dying is my biggest fear. Hands down. This includes me dying or someone close to me dying. It’s such an “unknown” and to have so little control over it and not even really truly know what it’s about, scares the crap out of me.
Also, flying on an airplane – which I guess ties into the dying.
Oh, and spiders. Definitely spiders.
I am also afraid of spiders.
“As is the case with grief or anger, I’m not sure we overcome fear, so much as we ultimately learn to manage it.” My fears involving my children will not disappear, yet I I have learned to manage it.
I’m afraid of being deprived of my freedom – to think, speak, act as I choose. The stuff other people mention, isn’t even a blip on my fear radar. That’s not to say that I jump on snakes when I run in the bush, or let go my baby’s hand when I’m on a train platform. But none of that stuff has a power to haunt me – it’s just a vague wariness, to keep a lookout for those hazards when I’m in that situation.
I can hardly begin to imagine how it must feel to be controlled by force, be overrun by people whose views and agenda are completely opposed to my own, to have no rights, no representative, no-one to appeal to for help. I wonder how many people are living the reality of my deepest fear?
I fear and then plan to attack those fears. Then, I fear my planning is not correct or won’t work.
And, as harsh as it may sound, I fear success.