Fear. The very word sends a tingling sensation along the length of my spine, but I smile and pull myself together, determined to not let it show. And the frustrating truth about it is that almost everyone you see, every day, has a fear embedded deep inside their hearts. From an infant’s fear of noisy vehicles to an eighteen year old’s fear of the future, it is almost everywhere and anywhere, and almost everyone succumbs to its wrath. Hey, I bet that if you ask me what my fear is right now, I would have probably said insects, or the pitch black that envelops me at night.
Right this moment, I’m sitting with my laptop near an open window, at my house in India. The electric current has gone out, and it is raining heavily, the water trickling down from the window, onto my lap as big fat drops. The wind is blowing hard and strong right at me as I type these very words, and I’m shivering, from fear or the cold I do not know. Small moths are crawling across my bright laptop screen, making me cringe up, fighting the urge to shriek my throat out.
I’m very afraid of insects. If you ask why, I don’t know, but something about those huge, flying beetles in India make me scream the house down. And for some mysterious reason, the insects always seem to make right for me. Mosquitoes, stag beetles, flies, you name it, and I’ll show you the respective bite.
Fears may seem silly at first, but gradually, they grow over time. That’s the most dangerous thing about them. They wrap around you and engulf you in all their terrible blackness until you’re gasping for breath. Fear of darkness, fear of heights, fear of enclosed spaces and others are some of the so-called ‘phobias’ that people have these days.
Sometimes these fears grow to such an extent that the person is driven up the wall by it. It can get irritating and other people get annoyed at you for jumping out of your skin very often. In fact, fear of their parents’ reactions when revealing bad examination marks is the very reason for about half of our country’s teenage suicides. The fear overpowers their will to keep living, and the kids see no other way other than destroying themselves, and throwing away everything they had ever known in their entire lives.
The one and only way, and yes, the only way, to get rid of your many fears, is just to face them. And I know this sounds silly and you’ve heard this over and over, but it’s the only way. Just open your eyes and ears instead of cowering, and look your fear right in the face. If its’s your fear of hairy cats, go visit a pet store. I can tell you that there’s no such pleasure than to stroke the soft hide of a golden Persian beauty. And if it is your fear of algebra problems, go right up to your math teacher and pour your heart out. Even if they seem annoying sometimes, teachers are the only solutions to some problems, and they are sure to listen to your various troubles. And if you’re an adolescent just like me, I can guess what your fear is right away. Almost all teenagers are worried about their future. When all your friends know what they’re going to be and you’re the only one still finding your ‘passion’, I can relate to the slight chill that sets over your heart and threatens to freeze you over.
Hey, it is going to be all right. Just keep calm, lift your chin up, and get ready for some challenges. ‘Cause we’re gonna drive your fear away today. Release yourself from fear and walk up freely to the trails and climb up the mountains fearlessly.
As Franklin D Roosevelt has rightly said “All we have to fear is fear itself.”