The Paralysis of Fear - Must Read

v.saisriniwasan

New member
Did you know that one of the most primal of all our emotions is fear. Of all of our feelings, it is fear that can serve to paralyze or motivate us. The classic Fight or Flight reaction is deeply embedded in all of us. How you behave when confronted with a overwhelming frightful situation is both a function of genetics and environment.

Human have a clear and distinct signature when it comes to their fight or flight response and it has been embedded in our behavior since we first evolved as a species. If there was a predator, you either got aggressive and combative to save yourself or you ran for your life to live to fight again. That was the law of the jungle and what you did and when you performed either an aggressive behavior or retreated back to safety was predicated on a variety of factors including your personal make up and prior experience with such situations as well as your health and readiness for a fight with an animal or possibly another of your own species.

Today, in modern times, the fight or flight reaction still very much exists but it manifests itself in different ways. No longer are their enormous creatures that you may need to fight or run from, bur rather the way in which you exhibit the fight or flight behavior takes on a different form. A person who is combative today may be one who shows their visible anger and become argumentative. Where one who is in the flight mode tends to be more submissive and passive, withdrawing from a verbal conflict. It can even take on the form of withdrawing altogether from society by retreating to substance abuse.

It is believed that males and females largely deal with the fight and flight syndrome in a different way due to the way they deal with stress. Males tend to kick into action when an emergency situation is revealed showing aggression (fight) whereas females more often look to get help from others (flight), hoping to diffuse the situation.

Why different people react in different ways to the same or similar stimuli is somewhat of a mystery but the theory first proposed by William Bradford Cannon in general described animals (humans included) as being reactive and largely governed by their sympathetic nervous system which causes them to respond with either aggression (fight) or flee (flight). All of our behaviors to a large extent are a function of a general adaptation syndrome which controls our responses to stress. The less stressful we are in our everyday lives, the less reactive and vulnerable we are to this sympathetic nervous system response. Fear can cause us to become prisoners to our automatic emotions that tend to kick off a fight or flight response. In a sense, we are all victims to fear as they take away from us that which makes us who we are as opposed to that which we were thousands of years ago.
 

poornima lagadapati

Active member
Anxious people can appear paralyzed by fear. They can go to extreme lengths to avoid anything that triggers their fear. They can make elaborate excuses and put off handling anything that produces anxiety.
 

Himanshi Agarwal

Well-known member
Paralyzed by fear -to impair the progress or functioning of; make inoperative or powerless

Fear really can kill you, but that doesn't mean it's time freak out. Such events appear rare, especially in healthy individuals without pre-existing heart conditions. And besides, if your fear is dying from fear, the best thing to do is certainly to calm down.

Most common fears -

Pteromerhanophobia: fear of flying. ...
Claustrophobia: fear of enclosed spaces. ...
Entomophobia: fear of insects. ...
Ophidiophobia: fear of snakes. ...
Cynophobia: fear of dogs. ...
Astraphobia: fear of storms. ...
Trypanophobia: fear of needles.

While for most the feeling passes, others become overwhelmed and unable to cope. In the short term, stress can leave us anxious, tearful and struggling to sleep. But over time, continuously feeling frazzled could trigger heart attacks, strokes, and even suicidal thoughts. “In short, yes, stress can kill you,”

The universal trigger for fear is the threat of harm, real or imagined. This threat can be for our physical, emotional or psychological well-being. While there are certain things that trigger fear in most of us, we can learn to become afraid of nearly anything.

Intense grief, acute anger, and sudden fear can have direct -- sometimes fatal -- effects on the human heart. And long-term emotional stress shortens lives by increasing the risk of heart disease, notes Daniel J. Brotman, MD, director of the hospitalist program at Johns Hopkins Hospital, Baltimore.

MAN'S GREATEST FEAR examines the fears of man which drive him to dominate woman, destroy his environment, and slaughter his own kind in war. The psychological defenses of man, which prevent him from facing his fears and thus changing his destructive behavior, are also identified and explained

Ways to Cope with Emotional Pain
Find a New Hobby. ...
Move Your Body. ...
Don't Ruminate. ...
Stop Telling the Story. ...
Start Keeping a Journal. ...
Cry. ...
Open Yourself to Others, Let Them In. ...
Make a List of What You're Thankful For.

Androphobia
Androphobia is defined as a fear of men. The term originated inside feminist and lesbian-feminist movements to balance the opposite term “gynophobia,” which means a fear of women. Misandry, another term that arose from the feminist and lesbian-feminist movements, is defined as a hatred of men.
 
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