As you have learned in the past blogs, which were subcategories, fears are made many different factors of your life both in your head and out in external factors. Being fearful of something is normal and not a bad thing, sometimes people think of fears as weaknesses but as a matter of fact they are not. Everyone has a fear and most have more than one. The goal of this blog was to find out why we have fears, and that is exactly what I found out. I learned that fears are memories that take place during a stressful scary time so that is how they are remembered, fearful. They are also easy to overcome and move on from, which is good. They not only affect your body but also your brain and more specifically your thinking process. In your body they affect your breathing rate, heart rate, body temperature and so much more sometimes from just thinking about that particular time. In the brain they give you creative thoughts to scary situations, for example if you were about to be stung by a bee and that was a fear of yours you might have a creative idea about how to kill the bee. You also get an adrenaline rush, so no need to worry about getting tired running from the bee either. Fears are a particularly weird concept and many people think they are from past lives, however that can not be proven. What can be proven is that they are negative memories in your brain that in order to get over them you have to face them, which in many cases is said to make you a stronger person, because what is a better feeling that facing something you always thought you couldn't. All in all fears take over your mind and body at the time they happen till the time you get over them, every time the slightest thought of the memory emerges into your brain your brain and body will react without fear. As a way of protecting you. Everyone deals with it differently, some thrive off of the energy of a fearful situation and some stay as far away as they can but at the end of the day fear is merely a basic human emotion and something every single person is equipped with.
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Overcoming fears can be different for each individual, they need the motivation to get over the fear and that is one of the most important steps in the process. When doing research on this step many people shared the same idea, first you have to recognize your fear before you can get over it. There are many Ted Talks about what fear teaches us and how you can overcome them, these are the resources I mostly used for this particular topic. Many people shared out their stories about overcoming fear and how they did it. (I will list the few that I used below in links) As I said earlier you have to recognize your fear and Olympia Lepoint states that you have to name and reject your fear, so if I had a fear of spiders I would have to name the fear and then reject it and tell myself that I wasn't afraid of them. This would be the first way to get over it. Fear is a memory in your brain so you have to figure out a positive feeling that took place at the same time and re-link the negative memory with the positive one, or in many cases if you face the fear that is a way to get over them. Like when you are little if you face the fear of being in the dark and realize no monsters are under the bed then you will realize your fear is irrational and it is okay to sleep in the dark now. This is the case for many fears and phobias.
Listed below are a some Ted Talks about getting over fear When our brain is stimulated from a fearful event we act differently than we normally would. Our brain has an automatic "fight or flight" response, so do you either fight of what is going on or do you just leave. Fear can work differently for different people, according to D'Arcy Lyness from kidshealth.net "Some people find the rush of fear exciting. They might seek out the thrill...Others do not like the experience of feeling afraid or taking risks." After the initial fight or flight response message sent to the brain then the body acts in the way that it is told to. This happens within the first few seconds of being fearful. After you feel better or are free from the fearful situation, your brain sends an all clear message to your body and then your heart rate goes down and breathing gets back to normal, the speed of this response can range from person to person and it is different because when experiencing fear everyone reacts differently. Yes we all breath faster and our hearts feel like they will come out of our chest, but some people react differently.
For more information click on the link below Fears forming is just as different as the fear itself. They form differently for every individual, because everyone's brain is unique. Fears and phobias form during particularly intense and scary situations. As a child we have many different fears because everything is new and we are vulnerable, it is important to outgrow these because we need to develop the understanding that monsters are not real and things like that. A common fear that many individuals have is the fear of flying, even though it irrational it forms so easily because when you hear about a plane crash it is a bigger headline than a car crash, even though " In 2016 just 271 people died in commercial plane crashes world-wide, compared with around 1.3 million in road crashes." Says Cheng, Eugenia of the Wall Street Journal online. The fears form because when there is a plane crash everyone hears about it, knows about and talks about it but when there is a car crash sometimes it isn't even acknowledged because it isn't that big of a deal, they happen all the time right? So people have this fear that they will die in an airplane but not a car crash, it anything they should be afraid of driving more. A phobia is a more severe version of a fear it is something a person cant think about without causing symptoms of fear to form. D'Arcy Lyness of Kidshealth.net says, "Someone might develop a bee phobia after being stung during a particularly scary situation. For that person, looking at a photograph of a bee, seeing a bee from a distance, or even walking near flowers where there could be a bee can all trigger the phobia." Whether it is the fear of flying or a bee phobia they all form the same, in your amygdala and in a particularly scary situation that your brain remembers as negative. Therefore it is a fear in your eyes now. Overcoming them is a little different and harder than forming them but it is possible and you can read about it in the blog titled, overcoming your fears.
For more information click on the link below for the wall street Journal article The term fear is very general and many people don't know what it means let alone what it actually is. As most of us know fear is an emotion, with that we can assume it is a strong emotion. According to Merriam-Webster dictionary fear is "an unpleasant often strong emotion caused by anticipation or awareness of danger". This is the actual definition of fear so now based of this fear is an emotion that is very strong caused by something in the past that happened or something that makes you feel in danger or on edge. Another word used to describe fear is anxious, so something that makes you anxious or uncomfortable could even be considered fearful. Fears are different for everyone. They range from a small disliking to a phobia which according to Merriam-Webster dictionary is, "an exaggerated usually inexplicable and illogical fear of a particular object, class of objects, or situation". So it is an extreme fear of something, these fears range for everyone. Some examples of common ones include, Arachnophobia which is the fear of spiders, Acrophobia which is the fear of heights, and Claustrophobia the fear of small spaces, according to fearof.net. Although fears are such strong emotions they are still curable and very easy to cure. In another blog I go in depth about getting over fears and what it is like to get over your fears. For more information you can click on the links below for the definition of fear and the list of fears used above. Fear affects our brains more than you think, and fear is an emotion so just like all the other emotions and the control center is in our brain. The Amygdala is located in the frontal portion of the temporal lobe in the brain. When fear is sensed the first thing the brain does is react to the signals from the Amygdala, this happens immediately, and is done instead of a more rational process. This "hijacks" the brain so all the events it undergoes are now seen as negative and are remembered that way too, therefore fear. The brain has the capability to remember everything that took place at a specific time and/or place where it was "hijacked". In this state of mind the brain can remember smells, sounds, sights, time of day, weather and many other things. The memories tend to be very durable but in fragments. Sometimes you may start to feel fearful at a random time for now specific reason, this is because the brain recalls past events or memories from a fearful or negative memory, hence feeling fearful. This can also lead to PTSD if it is sever enough but usually you just have a new fear of something.
For more information on how fear affects our thinking and out brain click the link below |
AuthorMy name is Emily Clamage and I am a junior at Metea Valley Highschool. ArchivesCategories |